Celebrities are constantly under the spotlight, followed by paparazzi and fans. Unfortunately, this leads to constant attention to their actions and words. More specifically, fans and speculators can infer from body language, tone of voice and timing of actions that some celebrities may be beefing. Understandably, with the vast amount of celebrities, not all of them are meant to be best friends or get along with each other. However, whether things are taken out of context or celebrities air their feud out to the public, the media and public eat up the drama and can become invested, adding fuel to the fire.
A more recent celebrity feud that has garnered plenty of attention from the media is the Selena Gomez and Hailey Bieber rivalry. This feud was first speculated by the public due to the very public relationship and breakup between Selena and Hailey’s now-husband Justin Bieber. Although Selena and Justin were on and off for years, Justin quickly became engaged to Hailey just months after their last breakup in 2018. Although fans analyze Justin and Selena’s relationship, they have turned toward analyzing how Hailey might be shading Gomez and connecting the dots between posts that might be aimed toward the other.
Although there has been speculation of a feud between Hailey and Justin Bieber against Selena Gomez, it was not as much of a big deal in social media until recently. The feud began catching more attention after fans speculated Hailey and Kylie Jenner were making fun of Selena’s laminated eyebrows. After this, fans began to label Hailey and Kylie as ‘mean girls’ and looked deeper into Hailey’s posts that might be copying Selena or shading her. This only blossomed further as social media users began posting TikToks analyzing Hailey’s behavior.
As more and more TikToks were being posted, fans became increasingly obsessed with the drama, wanting to find out more and what was going on behind the scenes. This led speculators to take sides in the feud, with them mostly siding with Selena. As a result, Hailey lost a lot of followers on Instagram and had an increase in negative comments and DMs. Additionally, speculators were comparing Justin and Hailey’s relationship with Justin and Selena’s relationship, analyzing the differences. This resulted in the public questioning Hailey and Justin’s marriage, as many of them were bigger fans of Justin and Selena together.
With the feud taking over social media platforms, filled with speculations and users siding with Selena, the two decided to speak up and address the public. Selena first posted on her Instagram story explaining that after Hailey has reached out to her, she is asking her fans to stop the hate and bullying and advocating for kindness. Additionally, Hailey also posted on her story thanking Selena for speaking out, berating social media for its harmful ways, and needing to be more careful of what we say or post due to things being taken out of context.
The Selena Gomez and Hailey Bieber feud demonstrates how far speculation on social media can go and affect the lives of those involved. The number of people invested in the drama differs based on how deep the feud is and how big the involved celebrities’ fan bases are. Fan bases typically stay up-to-date with their favorite celebrities and any news about them. Celebrity news itself serves as a form of entertainment, especially with the fascination of celebrities living the star life. As celebrities appear as if they are on a higher level due to their status, people become increasingly interested in their lives. This is especially true when it comes to celebrity drama. The drama itself serves as a distraction that pulls audiences away from their own life problems and invests their attention in a drama they are not involved in. Once they are pulled in, they become addicted to the narrative, wanting to keep up to date with the drama. However, there are some followers of celebrity drama that do not become as invested but do keep up with any new updates.
There has been a long history of various celebrity feuds that have garnered plenty of attention from the public. This is due to the overwhelming amount of posts that are created based on the drama. As the amount of social media users is higher today than in the past, it is easier to get lost in the drama and fall into a rabbit hole filled with videos and posts focused on celebrity feuds. All it can take is a single video speculating drama that could lead to a domino effect of more people jumping on speculations that hint at a possible feud. From there, social media platforms can be filled with drama, in which people cannot help but become heavily invested, especially when it gets talked about among peers.
Despite the amount of publicity celebrities can get from being involved in a highly popular celebrity feud, it is not always beneficial for them and their mental health. While for audiences it may be entertaining to see the drama unfold, there are other audiences that take the drama seriously and start to leave hateful comments toward celebrities. Since all the public knows about celebrities are based on stories, interviews, and others’ experiences with them, they can often forget they are human beings too. As a result, hateful comments can get to them and negatively affect their mental health. Additionally, audiences run a risk of feeding into a narrative that is not really happening and making stuff up solely for entertainment purposes.
While celebrity feuds have been shown to be entertaining and fascinating in the past, it has the risk of being harmful. Although it does serve as good entertainment for audiences, it affects the lives of celebrities and their relationships with others. For example, it may be creating a rift between two celebrities due to speculation they are fighting when in reality they are acquaintances in the industry that respect each other. However, it is difficult to not give these feuds any attention, especially with the high amount of coverage they deal with on social media platforms.
