The Untouchables

Gucci storefront on Rodeo Drive in LA!! Photo is my own

Do we put too much feeling and importance into the lives of our celebrity counterparts? Do people that are famous take up too much of our necessary energy and brain space? Do we love celebrities too much? While the answer to all of these questions is so obviously “Yes, yes we do.”, the answer is also so obviously “No, why would you ask that?”. Maybe this is because within every generation everyone has a different answer but, even then, how could that be so. For example, if we look back upon Elvis Presley, Marilynn Monroe, Johnny Cash, and even Elizabeth Taylor, we can see some sort of familiarity to the celebrities we seem to celebrate and idolize now. Maybe things are more complex now than they were when these legends roamed the streets, and maybe we have celebrities that are seemingly famous for no reason now-a-days, compared to then. Isn’t that interesting? Just some food for thought before I get to my point… which, I will do now.

In 2020 the world got diagnosed with a killer virus. You may not have heard of it, it’s called Covid-19 (again you may not have heard of it… it is super underground). Anyway, when this happened, I lost what I would call my entire social life. I became depressed, I stayed in bed a lot, I ate really badly, and I was desperate for some kind of connection. One day, I was scrolling on TikTok, and a video of Harry Styles came on. I sat and watched it and I thought, “wow I haven’t listened to him in so long”. I had always been a fan of him, I even had tickets to his concert , that would later get rescheduled, and then rescheduled again because of Covid. So, I closed out of the app, and I played a song called ‘Sweet Creature’. It is probably my all time favorite song of his. I am not completely sure what it is about, some say it’s about one of his ex lovers, maybe his sister, or even a childhood friend. But if you ask me, it is a song he wrote to his younger self. I think the song is about loving, losing, growing, and learning. It’s gripping. So, I played another song of his, and another, and then another after that. This soon became a pattern. I started to pay attention to his public life, interesting facts about him, I started to listening to One Direction again, I bought merchandise and had pictures of him adorning almost every surface of my room. Was I obsessed? Yeah, I probably was. But, I was mostly in awe of him. He had become my closest friend, and I had never met him. I told him secrets and cried with him. I would tell my friends that I loved him, because I did. Call me crazy if you want, but Harry, he meant the world to me.

Two days after Harry preformed at the Grammy’s in March of 2021, so about a year after Covid started, someone I didn’t know followed me on Instagram. I followed her back. She seemed cool, a little bit older then me, but most importantly, she was a fan of Harry also. This is important because, at the time, she was the only person I would have as a friend, that loved Harry as much as I did. So, I sent her a message. I won’t get into all the gory details, but since then, Brianna and I have become, and stay BEST of friends. All because of some British guy who sings about fruit, and wears nail polish. I think that is what I love the most about Harry. He has this way of bringing people, from all religions, races, sexualities, genders, and cultures together in one beautiful and perfect space. He has truly changed so many lives. However, to every positive, there is a negative. As I mentioned in the beginning of this post, celebrities now are idolized sometimes to a point of it being unhealthy. No, I am not talking about myself when I say that, but rather the small percentage of people that push fans like me into a bad light. When fans become obsessive, impulsive, and fame driven, the fandom and the person being fantasized over are unsafe. This is not something though that just Harry Styles and his fans face, it can be seen from celebrities like the Kardashians, all the way to Marvel actors, and even social media influencers. This is the difference between celebrities now and then. Sure, there were crazy fans, horrible accidents, and overall chaos then. But, when you mix money, looks, talent, an Instagram handle, and a horny teenager, you get something totally new and dangerous… and that’s Gen Z.

Sometimes I wish I had been alive then. To scream at the stage that Elvis danced on, to see Marilyn on a red carpet and hoped she would notice me, to listen to the record on the radio for the first time. I think it all seems so much more simple, with so much less hurt. I say hurt because when Harry’s tour got changed for the last time, the tickets I once bought for the Washington show, were essentially worthless to me. I had waited for 2 1/2 years to see this man that had changed my life, and I couldn’t. All the crazy fans who only wished to follow him all over the world, and rob others of the chance to see him just once, had taken all the tickets. I settled. But, then, by some fucking miracle, I got a solo ticket for his first night at Madison Square Garden. It wasn’t nearly as good of a ticket as I originally had, but I was going to see him. And that’s all that mattered. Here is photo evidence:

Harry Styles in Gucci. Night 1, MSG in New York City... Photo is mine. 

I want to start my conclusion by saying that I have not written this post to claim my title as a fan of Harry Styles. Nor have I done it to bash anyone who is a psycho crazy fan. I am simply doing it to say, I hear you. My generation is questionable when it comes to our love of celebrities, but not all of us are doing it just to stir up dust or to cause anyone trouble. Most of us are doing what our grandparents did best. We are loving the creators of life changing art. Harry Styles is someone to me that he may not be so any other person, and that is okay. Do I love him too much? Yes. Do I acknowledge it is strange how much I know about him, and how committed I am to his legacy? Yes. Do I know that I will probably never meet him? Yes. Is that going to stop me from ever writing about him again or talking about him? Nope. Just how people like Norman Rockwell, Meryl Streep, and even Elvis Presley have changed and maybe even saved the lives of many, Harry has done that for me. So next time you wonder whether or not someone is fangirling a little too much, know that they probably are, but don’t assume you know their reasons for doing so. Stan who you want, just be safe… don’t make it weird. OH! And Treat People With Kindness… it is just the right thing to do.

-Miss O