Social Media Focus: The Rise of Parasocial Relationships

A parasocial is defined as a person who invests emotional energy, interest, and time in a one-sided relationship, while the other party or person remains completely unaware of the existence of the first person. These types of relationships are most prevalent with celebrities, influencers, or sports teams, but they are not limited to criminals and sometimes regular people. 

There are many categories of parasocial people: some may ship their favorite celebrity with another; some may just be causal fans of celebrities, such as Sabrina Carpenter and other music artists; or some could be as extreme as thinking they’re actually in a deep romantic relationship with that public figure, where they are so delusional to the point they cannot come to terms with their favorite figure dating someone else. 

Many K-pop stans have strong opinions about their idols, more specifically with regards to their dating lives. The companies who manage these groups also enforce rules on idols not to date in order to protect their reputations and popularity. 

There have been many instances when fans find out that one of their idols potentially has a relationship and it leads them to go ballistic. There are also times when things from the idols’ past resurface on the internet which jeopardizes their image. Recently, there have been speculations revolving around a K-pop idol named Seunghan from the group Riize (SM). Seunghan went on hiatus for 10 months after news about him dating multiple girls and smoking. He returned and rejoined the group but numerous Korean fans decided to protest against his return by putting funeral wreaths outside of SM Entertainment as well as sending death threats on social media. 

In contrast, there are also ride-or-die stans who will defend all the actions of their favorite celebrity no matter what they did. Specifically, in the summer of 2021, Chinese rapper and ex-K-pop idol (he was in a group called EXO), Kris Wu was investigated for rape allegations. Kris Wu was one of the biggest celebrities in China at the time and was an ambassador for brands such as Bulgari, Louis Vuitton, and Porsche. His career ended as soon as a young woman detailed her story in a post on Weibo (a Chinese social media app), immediately after many others came forward to detail their experiences. Once victims of Kris Wu came forward, brands immediately started dropping him as their ambassador. Even after Kris Wu was sentenced to 11 years and 10 months in prison after being convicted as a serial rapist, he still has thousands of fans defending his every action. These fans do not know him personally and become so invested in his public persona that they detach themselves from the crimes he committed and the horrible actions he did to others. These types of fans are more on the extreme side of parasocial relationships where they truly believe their idol can do no wrong.

On October 7th, 2019, Wade Wilson was arrested for the murder of Kristine Melton and Diane Ruiz after he strangled, beat, pushed them out of a car, and ran over them repeatedly. Five years later, Wilson went on trial for the murders. His trial became viral and trending all over social media, catching the attention of women. Many videos were made about his case and people left numerous comments such as “I need to look at this man every day” and “Will never get tired of looking at this man.” These people became fans of his case and looked past his crimes and what he did. Wade Wilson was convicted guilty on June 12, 2024, and was given two death sentences on August 27th, 2024. After the crimes he committed, people still support him and believe he’s “too pretty” to be in prison. 

Not to mention as the case of the Menendez brothers has regained popularity, people who are strangers to them have been advocating for them to be freed from their life sentence in prison. The case of the Menendez brothers has been largely televised for over twenty years which has led them to become public figures. Countless shows, movies, and documentaries have been made about them. Recently, there has been speculation about whether the brothers might have a new trial because, allegedly, new evidence has been found supporting the brothers’ case. To add on, the cast in the new show “Monsters” have also gained popularity. More specifically, Nicholas Chavez, who played Lyle Menedez in the show, is featured in multiple edits that have accumulated millions of likes on TikTok, causing a huge swarm of people to swoon over him. 

Another common example that is less thought of as a parasocial (but by definition is one) is a sports fan. People who spend a lot of time and money following their favorite team or player can be parasocial. Although many people think parasocial people are the Taylor Swift fans who spend hours on Ticketmaster queueing up to buy tickets, a parasocial is simply anyone who has a one-sided relationship with someone (or something) who doesn’t know about their existence.

Some of the more harmless parasocial people are the day-to-day people who simply go online and find a celebrity, public figure, or influencer to have an innocent attachment with. Recently, celebrities like Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter have gained a lot of popularity and fans, which is a type of parasocial. Commonly, these spikes of popularity could be traced back to TikTok. A good example of this trend is when the movie “Saltburn” came out, immediately, tons of fan edits were made of the movie. Particularly, an edit of Jacob Elordi, one of the cast members, quickly started a wave of mass attention. Soon enough, people from all over the world were thirsting for him. This is a common pattern whenever a new movie, show, reality show, etc… is released (or sometimes when something old resurfaces), editors on TikTok are put to work and soon a huge crowd of people is obsessed with that specific person. Trends thirsting over Josh Hutchinson with the “Whistle” song, Evan Peters in the Netflix “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” Show, Nicholas Alexander Chavez in “Monsters, The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” Leah Kateb from “Love Island”, and so many more are a part of this parasocial culture.

After interviewing two students at Blake who self-identify themselves as parasocials, a common pattern can be observed. They both have felt stigma at school when talking about themselves being fans. They also have said they don’t think they will ever stop being fans of their respective celebrity/music group. The only difference between the two interviewees was their stance on their idol/public figure’s relationship: one said how they “don’t care” and one said how they “don’t like the current partner” of their favorite celebrity. Notably one of the interviewees said that they would identify themselves as “a stan because [they’re] a top listener every year.”

Overall, parasocial is just a term that can be used to describe any number of different fans and people often assume it is used to name extreme stans. Fan culture has been prevalent for thousands of years, but it’s evident that through social media it has been taken to another level where anyone anywhere can be idolized or pondered over.