Opinion: Social media influencers do not deserve their fame
May 1, 2019
Tik Tok, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitter are just a few of the apps social media influencers use to reach out to their fans. Some of the top influencers post a picture or video everyday and are paid thousands to do so. They’ve done no real work to earn their fame.
Social media influencers are paid up to $25,000 per post according to Vox. Fans can tell that many of the photos are all taken on the same date, based on location and what the influencer is wearing. So the person went out one time and took a series of photos to post later.
Tik Tok is the most absurd way to become “famous”. Influencers film themselves lip syncing and then post it on their account. While this takes no talent, it gathers millions of fans. Most of the influencers don’t have a place in Hollywood, yet most teens treat them as if they do. Some even try to launch a music career which is usually thoroughly autotuned.
It just doesn’t make any sense to dress trendy and take a few photos and then make a huge amount of money. It seems to simply be dumb as to how the teen influencers become “famous”, they’re mostly just dressing older than their age and acting as if they’re better than the rest of the teen population. Most teens already have the dressing part down, but not so much the money. A lot of teens are now trying to model themselves based on the influencers.
Being sponsored by brands is a whole other arena. Influencers are given free products all the time and all they have to do is post a photo with their product saying “#ad”. According to Accuracast, 71 percent of people believed there were no rules around the use of influencers, despite being regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA). However, most of the products are expensive and unaffordable by teens.
Many of the Influencers are made famous from a scandal either in their past or a current issue. This is a bad influence on teens and younger generations. It teaches them that in order to become famous or popular, you have to do something controversial.
Another problem regarding influencers is their unreachable body standards. 13 year olds are starting to look like they’re 21. Younger kids are admiring this person and they’re creating shrines in the form of fan pages, but yet the body standard they’re looking up to isn’t real.
Influencers are actually a really horrible influence. They’ve earned fame that is not worth their “talent,” and have no real personalities. Influencers only hurt the problem of unrealistic body image in the media and have unfavorable reputations that make the follower compare themselves to something unreachable.
Mohd Maaz • Jul 10, 2021 at 9:40 AM
I searched the internet to seek a sensible mind, I think I found it. The fact that we are normalising that influencers earn in triple figures while most life saving doctor don’t is saddening and scary what this generation is going forward go.