However, we shouldn't take everything at face value. As Brett Cullen, head of social media at Hatch PR, explains, "Celebrities have finely crafted public images, and social media is an important part of making or breaking that. There's a strategy behind why celebrities do what they do (or don't), particularly on social."
"Keeping control of that image, and the narrative of the brand, is ... crucial for celebrities," he adds. When you have millions of followers, it makes sure that your posts, comments, and even likes are carefully curated. The cost of a mistake can be too high.
Of course, that doesn't mean that every word is a lie. Personal brand builder Julie Bunkley emphasizes that forming your image is about "believing in yourself and your trajectory enough to put thought into how you can use every tool in your toolbox to place your brand where you want it to be."
She believes that professionals who are serious about their name should do so "actively, thoughtfully, constantly." In the case of celebrities, the words they share online are not necessarily false, but rather strategically filtered to shape the vision they want to project.
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However, we're not coo-coo if we're interested in celebrities' comments either.
Dr. Paul Harrison from Deakin University’s Faculty of Business and Law, who is an expert in consumer behavior and culture, believes we monitor and follow celebrities so closely because as humans we are constantly searching to understand how to improve our lives.
"Everything is about seeking a better life and a desperate desire not to be ignored or forgotten, so we look to celebrities to help guide us on how to achieve something akin to their lives. We know that we’re not the same, but we also have to believe that what they have achieved is only just out of our reach."
"In other words," he says, "it's all about fitting in, perhaps being a bit better. We believe that if we follow those with success, some form of authority or a sense of power, we set ourselves on the right path."
"Whether it's Taylor Swift, Donald Trump, Barrack Obama, the Kardashians, or the cast of Married at First Sight, all of these people feed into how we think we should (and shouldn’t) behave to achieve something that verges on a 'good life,'" Dr. Harrison continues. "The problem is, we are only seeing a proportion of their lives."
So while these comments can be entertaining, we shouldn't feed ourselves too much into them.
Celebrity worship syndrome is a disorder that occurs when admiration for someone shifts into an obsessive fascination. While it's not a clinically recognized condition, it's been described as an obsessive-addictive disorder.
