- This video is brought
to you by Squarespace, an all in one platform
for building your brand and growing your business online. Hello, my beautiful
doves, I know it's been a really long time, or it feels like a really
long time since I last posted, but that's because I also
went to Paris to work on a very specific project,
collaboration with a brand, which I'm really excited to share with you guys later this month. That and like my classes started again. So yeah, things have
just been kind of hectic on the home front, but I'm
getting back to schedule. I'm not planning to go anywhere
until the holiday season. And yeah, I'm really excited
to just honestly be cooped up and celebrate the fall,
which is my favorite month. (mellow music) - You know, my favorite thing
about the movie is like, it feels like a movie.
(crickets chirping) - So today's video is inspired by the "Don't Worry Darling" drama that was happening earlier last month. The Internet was pretty
inundated with this drama for like a couple weeks. Like every corner of the internet
that I was on was talking about it in some form or
another, whether it was memes, like the actual discourse
or just conspiracy theories. But because we as a
culture like to move on to the next thing at light speed, which I think the next Hollywood thing that everyone's been talking about is the new "Blonde" movie, which I hate to say it, I hate to say it, but I was right and I warned you all, and some people booed me for it, but I knew it was gonna be a shit show, and that seems to be what's
coming out about this movie. So I haven't watched it, I
don't know if I'm going to, because... yeah, I digress. That seems to be the
big discourse right now. So to recap what was happening last month with "Don't Worry Darling", "Don't Worry Darling" is Olivia Wilde's second directorial film. It's out in theaters now, it stars Florence Pugh and Harry Styles. Yes, the next question would
be can Harry Styles act? Honestly, you be the judge. - Not everyone gets this opportunity, and if you keep talking like this, you're gonna put it all at risk. Our life, Alice, our life together, this, we could lose this. - So in August, Wilde Told "Variety" that Shia LaBeouf was
supposed to be the lead role, but she fired him because
"His process was not conducive to the ethos that she
demanded her productions." Shia then refuted her
statement and said he left on his own accord and publicized all these receipts too, including
a video of Olivia trying to reconcile with him to
make the production work. And referring to Florence
Pugh shadily as Miss Flo. - Shia. Shia, Shia. I just went riding my
horse, I'm very sweaty, but I wanted to reach out
because I feel like I'm not ready to give up on this yet, and I too am heartbroken and
I want to figure this out. And you know, I think this might be a bit
of a wake up call for Miss Flo and I wanna know if you're
open to giving this a shot with me, with us, if she really commits, if she really puts her
her mind and heart into it at this point. - There had been a lot of
speculation about Florence and Olivia not getting along on set, and a lot of the speculation is because Florence was not
promoting this movie at all, even though she was initially very excited to be on the project
before filming started. But behaviors at the Venice
Film Festival made everything pretty clear in my opinion. For example, Florence chose
to skip the press event instead rocking up to
Venice in a Valentino fit, holding an Aperol Spritz,
iconic moment if you ask me, that's just kind of like the main event. But there were other things like Florence avoiding
eye contact with Olivia at the Venice Premier, Florence's stylist writing
the Instagram caption, "Miss Flo" under a picture of Florence and Florence leaving early so
that the applause had to stop. So I, as far as I know, we never got to the
bottom of why they were allegedly not getting along, but some conspiracy theories
were floating around. Some people said it's because
Olivia and Harry were being unprofessional and showing up late to set. Some say it's because Florence
and Olivia's ex-husband, Jason Sudeikis are
friends, but regardless, the fact that the
internet was so enraptured by this three person drama
for like weeks is a testament to how entertaining
celebrity gossip can be, especially when it's stupid. Like the whole idea that
Harry Styles purposely spit on Chris Pine, and Chris Pine's agent or publicist had to come
forward and be like, "Yeah, that didn't
happen, that's not true." So for this video, we're mostly gonna be
talking about the history of celebrity scandals in Hollywood and also what it's like today. And also something very new
that is happening in this video that has never happened
before is I'm inviting a guest to come speak about this, a surprise guest and
you'll just have to tune in to see who it is.
(static whirring) Once again, thank you. Squarespace, for sponsoring this video. If you don't know where to start, Squarespace has a bunch
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of a website or domain. (static whirring)
(mellow music) First of all, humans are
naturally interested in gossip. I don't care what anyone says, this is just the truth of the matter. I definitely have had
some friends in the past who were like, "I don't
gossip" and like, you know, have that whole holier than thou attitude. But the truth of the matter, the fact of the matter
is that everyone does it. Some people just don't
recognize that they're doing it because it's doesn't have to be malicious. Case in point, despite being
stereotyped as a woman thing, psychologist Jeffrey G. Parker
and Stephanie D. Teasley actually found that boys and girls engage in similar amounts of gossip. So just to clear the air, what
is the definition of gossip? According to researchers at
the University of California, Riverside, who studied
the nuances of gossip, "Gossip in the academic's view is not bad. It's simply talking about
someone who isn't present. That talk could be positive,
neutral, or negative." Gossip has a pretty bad reputation for skewing towards the negative. But in a 2019 meta-analysis, analyzing 467 subjects on average, most of the gossip the subjects
partook in on a daily basis was actually deemed neutral and boring. But gossip is a pretty positive behavior regardless of what you're
actually talking about, because it staves off
loneliness, creates closeness and serves as a form of entertainment. According to York Bergman, the primary function of
gossip is to generate a sense of intimacy and connection
between gossipers through the creation of shared meaning about their shared world. Researchers at University
of California Berkeley found that gossip can also
help lower stress levels. In terms of celebrity gossip, aka gossip that circulates the
lives of the rich and famous, Karen Sternheimer says, "Celebrity stories can help us
make sense of our identities, not simply by telling
us how we should look, feel, think or act, but through a social
process of negotiation. For instance, in the 1950s, a lot of women latched
onto celebrity stories like Marilyn Monroe having
difficulty conceiving a child as a vehicle to discuss
their own personal ideals and struggles surrounding
fertility and childbirth. Gossip media has
traditionally taken the form of gossip columns and tabloids, but more recently has evolved
into Instagram accounts like "Deuxmoi," more on that later. And "TikTok StoryTimes." To really understand
the gossip industry, we really have to start
from the beginning. (mellow music) Salacious stories about the rich and famous have been a
concept for a while now. For example, historians have
looked at cuneiform tablets from the 15th century BCE, which discussed the allegations that a Mesopotamian mayor
was committing adultery with a married woman. There were also a few local group columns throughout the 18th century that people think inspired
Lady Whistledown's character from "Bridgerton" such
as Mrs. Crackenthorpe, who penned "The Female Tatler"
from 1709 to 1710 in England. In terms of the commercial
publication of gossip in the US that really spiked in
the 1830s with the birth of the penny press during
the Industrial Revolution, Penny Press newspapers were
cheap, mass produced newspapers. They famously costed only a cent to buy and therefore made news
way more accessible to the middle and lower classes. At this time, printed
gossip was salacious, but they were mostly pulled
from official records such as court documents
and arrest records. It was Walter Winchell
who's often credited with inventing the modern gossip column. Winchell's column first
appeared in the 1920s in the newspaper "New York Graphic." His column mixed in official sources with unofficial information
regarding pregnancies, divorces, and liaisons. Because Winchell's
column was so successful, other newspapers across
the country started to write their own gossip columns. Also something to add, it might be hard to believe
now because tabloids and gossipers get such
a bad rep these days, but in the early 20th century,
gossip columnists were like highly regarded
newspaper journalists. At his peak in the 1940s
Winchell reached about 90% of the American public through his columns and radio broadcasts and was
said to be one of the most powerful men in the world. These gossip columnists
were also an essential part of the Hollywood studio system. Studio execs were aware that a good feature
could increase the appeal of their stars, which would then drive
profits at the theaters. Two women specifically, Hedda
Hopper and Louella Parsons, were reputable writers who
had a symbiotic relationship with the studios. They would get the inside scoop on stars as long as they didn't
antagonize the studio moguls. They were also fierce rivals
and always waiting for scoops. For example, when Joan
Crawford married Philip Terry in 1948, she told Louella
first, which infuriated Hedda. Hedda telephone Crawford
soon after saying, "I will ruin you." When Joan ran into Hedda
at a Hollywood party, she apparently begged for forgiveness, but Hedda just walked away. In the early 20th century, gossip columns were actually also featured in reputable newspapers
while fan magazines, which were general pop culture magazines like "Cosmopolitan," which came
out in 1886 and "Photoplay," which came out in 1911, were notorious for being pretty sanitized when it came to celebrity coverage. There were gossip columnists who wrote for these celebrity magazines such as "Photoplay's," Cal York, but generally these columns
were still free of any innuendo and seldom revealed any
like breaking news facts about the stars. Anthony Slide writes, "The most famous of the
gossip columnists active in the newspaper world could be found within the pages of the fan magazine, but their contributions
were generally lightweight, often in reality written by
staffers and very obviously secondary to and probably
based on the items found in their daily outlets." So these articles were so
sanitized that even major scandals such as the deaths of actress
Thelma Todd and Paul Burns were pretty much ignored or just mentioned in a few sentences. It was the newspapers that
Americans could get their cup of tea for the day. Gossip columnists in the
papers covered everything from the 1922 murder of
William Desmond Taylor, a famed film director, to the 1921 and 1922 trials of Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle, a popular silent film star
and comedian who was tried for the murder of actress
model Virginia Rappe. Speaking of these incidents, one of the reasons why the Hays Code otherwise known as the
Hollywood Production Code, you know, the reason why a lot of these old Hollywood
movies were heavily censored, one of the main reasons
why this code was enacted in the first place was
because of all the crime and scandals happening in
Hollywood in the 1920s. That and the fact that a
lot of Hollywood moguls were Eastern European Jewish immigrants, which didn't sit right with America's anti-Semitic viewpoints. Catholic and other religious
organizations were staging like theater exits and
walkouts and protests because they believed
Hollywood was pushing these movies that were full of sin. So all in all, Hollywood producers thought that if they put their
own production code in, that would give them more freedom than having an outside, you know, government body coming in and
inserting a code for them. Well, let's fast forward to
the birth of "Confidential," one of the most notorious gossip magazines of the 20th Century. "Confidential" was founded
by Robert Harrison in 1952. Harrison was actually inspired
by Walter Winchell himself and wanted to offer readers
behind the scenes stories and gossipy facts. Harrison once said, "people like to read about things they don't
dare do themselves. And if you can print these things about public figures so much better." After only five years of publication, "Confidential" sold
nearly 4 million copies of each issue making it
the best selling magazine on American news stands. Hollywood, of course, was
horrified by these stories, and multiple celebrities filed lawsuits against "Confidential,"
including Maureen O'Hara, Liberace and Errol Flynn. However, most celebrities,
even if they had an issue with "Confidential," were afraid of suing because they felt that if they were, you know, if they took
the magazine to court, they would either have to come
out with a full story about, you know, whatever scandal
they were involved in, or they would have to verify
whether that scandal was actually true or not. Eventually, the heads of six
major studios got together to file a lawsuit against
the magazine pleading to Attorney General,
Edmund Brown, for help. In May, 1957, Brown and the state of California
indicted "Confidential," Harrison and its contributors
charging them with conspiracy to commit criminal libel. Harrison then hired private
Detective Fred Otash to subpoena mega stars,
including Clark Gable, Frank Sinatra and Mike Todd. But as the court date got nearer, all these stars started
fleeing from Hollywood because they did not wanna
show face at the trial for reasons I just mentioned. In the end, the jury was deadlocked and Harrison was financially wiped out having spent $400,000 on
"Confidential's" defense. Rather than push for another trial, he decided to reach a plea bargain. Brown would drop all charges
if "Confidential" would only publish flattering
stories about celebrities. After several celebrity friendly
articles were published, the public was bored and
"Confidential" sales plummeted, and Harrison eventually sold the magazine. But in general, I do
wanna say that the law typically sides with the press because in 1964 the Supreme Court ruled that in order to make a
libel or defamation claim, a celebrity must prove that a news publication knew
the information was false and published it anyway, thereby acting with actual malice. But around the same
time, a lot of newspapers that carried gossip columns
were folding as well. In late 1962, the printer strike killed a
number of New York newspapers, including the "New York Mirror," which was Winchell's
main paper at the time, Luella's hometown outlet,
the "Los Angeles Examiner" folded the same era as well. Most towns were left
with one newspaper now, and because of this lack of competition, editors felt the freedom
that they hadn't had before. They no longer had to depend
on these salacious headlines to get readers. So most of them pivoted to delivering more like serious news. And then "People Magazine"
came along in 1973. "People" a Time Inc paper came out when life folded and was
headed by Dick Stolley and exploited what Stolley called OPP, Other People's Problems. The magazine started as
a feel good publication, but by the late 1970s was filled with stars' traumatic stories such as Karen Carpenter and her anorexia, Drew Barrymore and her drug problems and Farrah Fawcett's divorce. These stories inevitably
encouraged readers to sympathize with featured celebrities, but Jeannette Walls explains what really set the magazine apart. "People's greatest innovation
was packaging tabloid content in an upscale package with the imprimatur of a reputable publisher." Around the same time, publicists were finally
getting their share of the Hollywood power. For the first half of the 20th century, publicists were mostly pleading
to these gossip columnists to get features about their stars because at the time the philosophy was celebrities needed the press. But in 1971, Pat Kingsley, a Hollywood publicist
and two partners formed Pickwick Public Relations,
which later became PMK. And by 1980s, the Hollywood
environment had changed. There were more TV shows and publications that needed movie stars
than there were movie stars to begin with. So Kingsley started
withholding her clients only allowing features if they were offering the best coverage and the most flattering photography. Some publicists were even
using blackballing tactics to make sure that only favorable
stories were coming out about their clients. Writer, Stephanie Mansfield, who did a story on Tom
Cruise in 1992 for "GQ," claimed to be a victim. After talking to Tom
for an hour and a half, she felt he was aloof
and not easy to read. I don't know much about Tom Cruise other than the fact that
he's a Scientologist, this like photo of Nicole
Kidman post divorcing him and Christian Bale using him as a model to create his character
for "American Psycho." - That if we turn the oxygen
off from the back guy, that we could make it at this altitude. (audience laughing) - So I feel like given that context, "aloof" to me sounds pretty flattering. But coincidentally, soon
after the interview, Stephanie was connected with Tom's former high school classmate
and interviewed her as well. Despite this classmate being
allegedly very positive about Tom, Pat Kingsley, when she heard about this, was very upset. And according to Stephanie, "She said, and this is a direct quote, 'Tom is going to be around
for a long time and I'm sure that you wanna be around in
your business for a long time.' I said, 'Pat, I don't know
what you're driving at.' She made it very clear that if
I used any of this interview from this young girl, I would be blacklisted from her clients. Pat Kingsley has defended herself saying, 'I've been in the business
too long to threaten someone. What I did say is that
it would be a long time before I would subject a client
to an interview by her.'" So to give an understanding of
how powerful publicist became in 1993, "Vanity Fair" had
agreed to put Andie McDowell, a PMK client on the cover. But then a last minute of interview with Bill Clinton came through. Magazine editors were so scared about how PMK would react if
they pulled Andie's cover story, they ended up printing two
versions of the magazine, one with Bill and one with Andie. This is not to say that
tabloids completely died and publicists were fully
controlling the narrative of what was going on about their stars. There were still like less
reputable press channels that were hounding stars, taking up skirt photos, stalking them. If the death of Princess Diana, harassment towards Pamela Anderson and Britney Spears' public
breakdown have anything to show, it's that the power of the media can still affect a celebrity detrimentally with or without a
publicist to protect you. - I would like for them to leave be alone. (mellow music) - So in the 2000s we got the
rise of the 24 hour news cycle and "TMZ" was founded in 2005. Cell phones became a daily part of life, which made accessing news
possible at any time. Gossip blogs like "Perez
Hilton," "Socialite Rank," "Lainey Gossip," "Crazy Days And Nights," "The Shade Room" and "Blind Gossip" were highly traffic sites that posted mostly
rumors about celebrities with little fact checking. However, that's not to say that they never had a breaking story. On July 16th, 2012, "Crazy Days and Nights"
published a blind item titled, "The Actress Who Loves
A Child (censored)." A Blind Item is a news story
that keeps the identities of the people involved anonymous. This blind item referred to the
actress as a B-list actress. The man was described as
loving woman and teens and the actress apparently knew about her boyfriend's taste, defended him and even recruited
another B-list actress into a threesome. Six months after this initial post, the site republished this
entry with a list of names: Allison Mack, Kristin Kreuk, Keith Raniere. Six years after this
blind item was posted, Keith Raniere was charged for his role in leading a cult-like group called NXIVM that was engaged in
(censored) trafficking, identity theft, extortion, forced labor, money laundering and wire fraud. Another example, in 2012, Gawker, which was originally a gossip blog before it got relaunched in 2021, blogged about Lewis CK's
sexual misconduct allegations, which was five years before the
"New York Times" covered it. And then in 2017, "Lainey
Gossip" founder, Elaine Lui, told Fox that in regards to
Harvey Weinstein's sexual abuse for the 15 years that I've been reporting, that's how long I've
been hearing about it. I think even though a lot of
these publications tended to be very misogynistic, body
shaming, slut shaming, not being associated with a legacy media like the "New York Times"
or "Vanity Fair" allows them to post whatever crazy story without fear of getting blackballed by the industry. Especially if it's a site that
allows anonymous submissions. Because I can imagine a lot
of people in the industry knew what Harvey Weinstein was doing, but felt like they couldn't
put a story out about it because he was such a
powerful man at the time. So tablets have been
declining since the 2,000s. And celebrity gossip blogs have also been kind of like fading. A lot of people chalk this
up to the widespread use of social media and the
fact that celebrities now have a direct channel
to talk to their audiences. As Joseph Longo writes for "MEL Magazine," "We're in an era where ingenue actresses and celebrity power couples can
control their own narratives and interact with fans
on Twitter and Instagram. They don't need million dollar "People" pregnancy announcements or paparazzi photos at Saddle
Ranch to gain attention." Some celebrities have also
taken to social media to talk about how the gossip media
and tabloids and press have negatively affected their mental health. Meghan Markle and
Constance Wu have discussed how insults and ridicule have led them to suicidal thoughts and even actions. Taylor Swift also spoke about
how having photos taken of her every single day negatively
impacted her body image and relationship with food. I think it's always a
positive thing to gain multiple perspectives about
a certain, you know, issue. Like I think it's actually
really good that celebrities have this ability to speak and to
defend themselves and you know, share what they're actually going through because it does humanize them in a sense. But on the flip side, I think because celebrities
now have this mouthpiece, it can discourage a lot of
writers from writing the kinds of stories they want to write about them in fear of getting attacked by stans. And I don't know, this is like one of those
things where I don't think like a celebrity is necessarily
at fault for having stans, but it is just the
reality of stan culture. Though I will say sometimes celebrities do like incite their stans. For instance, in September, 2021, Nicki Minaj posted the phone
numbers of two reporters on her Instagram story with the words, "Bitch, your days are fucking
numbered, you dirty ho." So the context of this is that
these journalists were trying to contact Nicki's cousin's friend who allegedly got swollen
balls as a side effect of the COVID vaccine
and who was the reason why Nicki was not getting
the vaccine herself. As a result, Nicki doxxed them on her story and these journalists
were getting inundated with spam calls and death threats. The other downside with
celebrities having this like platform is that it gives
this mirage of authenticity when in reality most of their
social media channels are still like heavily monitored by PR unless of course they
decide to forego that and publish something
completely out of left field. Like, I don't know, Sydney Sweeney publishing a Twitter note about her Blue Lives Matter
family that didn't go too well. I've been saying that
tabloids have been falling out of favor for a long
time now, they still exist, like you can go to any
supermarket and find them close to the cash register, but it's actually pages like "Deuxmoi" and "Comments By Celebs" and "Overheard Celebs" on Instagram, which are the up and
coming hottest sources of celebrity gossip today. These pages mostly rely
on user submissions, which invite audiences to not
just observe but participate. The "New York Times" writes,
"What "Deuxmoi" tends to post and what readers seem to gravitate towards are anodyne stories
that usually go unreported by magazines like
"People" and "Us Weekly." How does an actor respond when someone asks them for a picture? What does a pop star say
to a flight attendant on a trans-Atlantic flight?" The anonymous founder of
"Deuxmoi" explains her approach. "It's almost like the anti-gossip gossip. That part of my account
was always supposed to be a little bit satirical,
making fun of the people that take gossip so seriously." Like all kinds of media, every little snippet of
gossip needs to be taken with a grain of salt, though usually, even if the stories aren't true, they're usually harmless enough where it wouldn't affect someone's career. For example, "Deuxmoi" posted that Leonardo DiCaprio apparently really enjoys having sex
with his headphones on. I don't think he's gonna lose
any of his upcoming roles because of that little bit
floating around on the Internet. Other changes I've noticed about the the celebrity gossip industry is that people are way more
skeptical about whether something is a publicity stunt. Of course, PR stunts aren't new. They've existed since like
the old Hollywood days. In 1920, Harry Reichenbach, a publicist known for staging
sensational publicity stunts hired an actor to rent a room in New York's Hotel Belleclaire under the name T.R. Zann. So the story goes that Mr.
Zann suspiciously requested 10 pounds of raw steak. The hotel staff found out that
that steak was for a lion cub that he was keeping in the hotel room. The police and press arrived at the scene and Mr. T.R. Zann explained to them that the lion would appear at the opening of an upcoming movie,
"The Return of Tarzan." I think the difference now
between a lot of these PR stunts of the early 20th century
and PR stunts now is that PR stunts of today
are way more elusive, like it's not really
clear whether something is a publicity stunt or if it's
something that's actually true. The best example I can think
of is PR relationships. Like I don't think anyone in a
PR relationship has ever come forward that their relationship
was a PR relationship. And I think in general
what's happening recently is that there's a lot of skepticism about celebrities and
the level of authenticity that they show. It's just like I think the pandemic that really put celebrity
culture in the red because the amount of tone deaf behaviors, the partying, the private jets, the vacations when everyone
else was in lockdown. I don't think I need to
bring up the "Imagine" video or Ellen's comment about
how self quarantining felt like being in a jail, but
you know, I just did anyway, so this was just kind of
like the basic rundown of celebrity gossip. Now I wanna bring on our special guest and I think she'll offer some
really interesting insights for the rest of us. Would you like to introduce yourself? - Yeah. Hi, I'm Shannon,
aka Fluently Forward online. - Can you explain a little bit
about your Fluently Forward branding? - Yes, yeah, I have a podcast and accounts called Fluently
Forward and we basically talk about different like celebrity gossip. So we cover a lot of blind
items about celebrities and then we kinda tie the blind items into like actual real world scandals to see if they match up and see if we can kinda see like some of these
open secrets in Hollywood, do blind items reveal it, and ala Epstein or Harvey Weinstein, can we find out about these
things that are happening like two years before the public does? - Do you think that celebrities
have the right to privacy? - I think they have the right
to privacy in, I don't know, any situation where it's
like deeply personal to them and they're not, for example, like giving out any information about it. So something that people talk a lot about or at least in my world, is the whole theory of
is Taylor Swift bisexual? Who are these songs really about? And I think you can speculate
anything about a song that someone puts out
because it's information that's out there. But if you are digging through their trash to find something, if you're a paparazzi through their windows to get evidence of who they're with, I
think that's unethical. But I think if it's anything
that the celebrity releases themself, you can speculate
and gossip and make like, you know, conjectures about that stuff. - So do you think paparazzi
photos are inherently unethical? - I think so, I mean the
paparazzi have like killed people, so I just think that's
a little bit sketchy. But then it is weird, right? Because if "Deuxmoi" has a
blind item about, you know, Oh I saw this couple walking on the street just because the photo
wasn't taken by a paparazzi, does that mean that it is ethical? I don't really know. - Yeah, that's actually something that I've been thinking about because I started following "Deuxmoi" so I've been seeing like
all their like Sunday recaps and I always think like
I'd be really creeped out if someone took a photo
of me just randomly eating like a hamburger at a restaurant. - I'm sure that has
happened to you before. - Oh God! No, I guess
not that I would know. But you know like "Deuxmoi"
such like a huge platform that it's like what like a
million people are seeing you at like this very un,
like glamorous moment. - And celebrities have,
I spoken out about it, I think Hailey Bieber said
that she didn't wanna be in any of the Sunday Spotted and
she hasn't been since. - Okay, so you can request
- So sometimes, yeah, they do. - to opt out?
- I guess so. She kinda changed the game. Hailey Bieber is like very quick to say when she doesn't like something. - This is like something that's kind of related to
"Deuxmoi," but not really. But do you remember when that video of Ian Somerhalder came out where, wait, do you not know who that is? - Oh, I know, the vampire. - Yeah, the vampire, the sexy vampire. Or at least when I was 12 I
thought he was a sexy vampire. But there was like a
video that went viral. - You guys, listen. No, no, stop. Everybody listen, I love you guys. I'm not taking a single
photo today. It's my day. Don't follow us please. I love you guys. You're so good to us. You're so awesome. - Just want one, please.
- No, it's not just one. Hey, I'm right here.
- Oh my God. - But you guys, don't follow
us please. I love you guys. Do not follow us. Okay? It's too much. - And then that video went viral and then all these people were like, "Oh my God, he's so ungrateful. Like he's like the worst
person ever, hates his fans." Which I think that's like an example where I pretty much side with Ian, but in just like an instance
for Deuxmoi where someone's like, "Oh this person didn't
wanna take a photo with me." The way that they write it is like this person's like a terrible person. They're really mean to their fans. Where it's like they
might just not have wanted to take a photo that day. And in that sense I feel like
it's sometimes really sad or like kind of dangerous
to just like depend on like this one snapshot
of a person's life to make like a judgment about
who they are as a character. And I think sometimes "Deuxmoi"
does like foster that. - Yes, yeah, sometimes the
tea is just little snippets and little snippets doesn't
make up someone's personality. But I think something was
going on with Conan O'Brien recently and I'm blocked by "Deuxmoi", but I saw it on the subreddit. So it was a blind about how "Deuxmoi" or how Conan O'Brien
stole muffins at a hotel and brought it to his family. And this is the only bad
things that's existed for years about Conan O'Brien and it
could also be a fake story. Nobody knows, but
everyone's now like, "Wow, Conan O'Brien stole those
muffins," and what they don't take into account is that there's
one tiny negative story about him, but how do you
add up all of the years of no negative stories? So that'll be the same thing, right? Like Dylan O'Brien seems
a little bit grumpy when he was getting coffee
and nudged me as he walked by. Okay, that's one negative point, but where are all of the people
to say he was great to me, He took a photo, he donated, he did this. So when we live in this world
of just gossip and scandals, something that I really like
is on "Crazy Days And Nights," they have kindness blinds. So you'll see, you know,
maybe 10 different items about a celebrity being rude, but who's shouting out all
of their charity work, right? Who's shouting out all of the gifts that they did send to fans? So it seems a little bit
uneven when people are on gossip threads looking
for reasons to hate someone. 'Cause you're always gonna find it. - Do you remember when that
Addison Rae's dad's girlfriend, like the toilet seat licker, licked? - Yes.
- And how she spread that story about Jeffree
Star and Kanye West or I don't think she like
specifically used their names. Like it was like a blind item right? On TikTok.
- Yeah. - And for some reason people
were flooding the comments with like, "Oh it's
Jeffree Star and Kanye" and I remember that
being on my Twitter feed for like 48 hours. - It gave us some good memes. But that Lea Michele
not being able to read, sometimes rumors do get solidified as fact and they're completely false. Yeah.
- Yeah, or Harry Styles being bald.
- That one I'm so, so on. (both laughing) I've seen some photos, I've seen some photos of that
hair really flipping around. - I don't think he's like fully bald, like I think he has like
a toupee that he wears like to add some volume.
- Me too, me too. - To bring some hair to the front. But I don't think he's like fully like, you know-
- Yes, I don't think he's, he doesn't have a Mr. Clean
type of head but I think he also doesn't have like
a Chewbacca situation. - Yeah. He's not like luscious. - Yes.
(both laughing) - So I guess kind of
being related to all that, is there a scandal that you
thought was not scandal worthy that made all these headlines? I guess the one that's true. - Yeah, I have to say
I'm still so confused by Donutgate with Ariana Grande. I think, you know, licking a donut probably
not the best thing to do, but I think it's also not a sin. At least when I went to CCD it wasn't. And that was just such a
tiny thing that blew up and maybe because of the absurdity of it, but I have to be honest, I was kind of fine with the
fact that she licked a donut. - Do you think that the way like we even use the term scandal
like in our lexicon is bad? Just the fact that that could encase like two completely different extremes, you know someone committing
like terrible crimes versus someone just like doing something like absurd in public? - I think that all the time
and I especially think that with women and men, right? Hence, Chrissy Teigen massively canceled, she tweeted something horrible to a girl. She's tweeted some wild
things over the years. Shia Labeouf was abusive
to his ex-girlfriend, has been domestically
abusive to so many people throughout the years, he's
still starring in movies, his cancellation kind of ebbs and flows. Same with Chris Brown. So I do think that sometimes
men in Hollywood commit actual crimes and their scandals and then women in
Hollywood will lick a donut or tweet something and they get canceled with the same ferocity,
which is just crazy to me. Again you even see it in
cheating scandals, right? Too when there's three women involved, the Instagram model
that exposed Adam Levine so much vitriol towards her, Adam Levine got a few
memes, you know what I mean? Or Jordyn Woods will forever be associated with the Khloe Kardashian,
Tristan Thompson scandal. Tristan kinda got, he's still on the show, he's still involved with the family but Jordyn's forever excommunicated. So I feel like whenever
there is a scandal we do typically give more flack
to the woman than the man. - Do you think that there's
ever gonna be a moment where that changes? Because I don't know, for me, like I thought we were moving
in a progressive sense. Okay, for example, like Monica Lewinsky, I feel like she has been
looked on more favorably over the years, like since the initial like Bill Clinton issue. But then at the flip side,
like I felt like a lot of the Olivia Wilde
discourse was misogynistic. The Adam Levine discourse was misogynistic and it just like leaves me going, what is going on with the world? Like where are we going? - Yeah, I mean I think that we like to think we've gotten better. I think if the Monica
Lewinsky situation happened today we would still give
Monica Lewinsky so much grief. But I do think maybe
it's a mixture of sexism but I think it's also a mixture of ageism. So I think a lot of times
if you see a scandal with three women, and this didn't happen with Jordyn Woods as much, but you'll be like oh
well the woman did this and she's a full grown woman so she should have known better. But I think typically when we are, I think getting better in today's culture, talking about power balances
and different power dynamics. So I think if Monica Lewinsky
happened today we would be better about it because there
was such a clear power dynamic and an age difference. But I think she would
still get a lot of grief because she's a woman. - Right.
- Yeah. - I guess like in terms of age, do you think that there's a strict cutoff for like when someone is can
sort of like evade scandal for being too young to know better? - I think maybe if you're under the age of 21 it's a little bit easier. I'm just thinking of Adam
Levine's Instagram girlfriend who I think was like 22. And everybody was like,
she's a full grown woman but Olivia Rodrigo is
19, she's a child, so. - Yeah, I got so much
flack because I tried to defend Adam Levine's mistress. - Me too.
(both laughing) But I did it on Twitter, which is probably the
worst platform to do that 'cause I was like why don't
we talk about the fact that there was a 20 like
age gap between the two and the fact that there's like
a literal celebrity sliding into your DMs, like, I mean I
don't wanna incriminate myself but like I don't know
what I would do if someone who was really big and
famous and I was like young and just out of college and
I didn't have much going, well, I don't wanna say
she has nothing going on but you know what I mean, like you know, you're so at the beginning of your career. - Yeah. - Like I don't know how I would particularly respond in that sense. And I don't know if it
was like necessarily fair to like pile onto her when
there is that power imbalance. Like even though she could
have said no, I guess, or like ignored him. - But also I think what a lot
of people fail to realize is Adam Levine was probably lying to her. If he's lying to his wife and
he's been serially cheating on her for years, he's probably also lying
to the affair partners. That's what cheaters do. So I think people blame
all of these women, right? Bill Clinton probably
said to Monica Lewinsky, "Oh our marriage is just
one of convenience." And Tristan probably said to Jordan Woods, "Oh, Khloe and I are just
together for the TV show." And Adam Levine probably said to Sumner, "Behati and I are in an open relationship, everyone in Hollywood is,
that's just how it works." And he probably spun some sort of tale and I think that's what happens and people just immediately
view these affair partners as villainous people who
must have been in on it. They were probably getting tricked too. Maybe not to the same
degree but a little bit. - I don't know if you've read this article that Rayne Fisher-Quann did called like "Being Like womaned." And this like whole phenomenon
of being like canceled as a woman just because you're like. Popular.
- I've seen tweets about it, yeah.
- Kinda like how Jennifer Lawrence
and like Anne Hathaway, do you think someone else
is gonna be the next woman to be womaned? - I think Doja Cat got a little
bit womaned a little bit. I think anytime you're like
a relatable female celebrity who's being funny or quirky
or something like that, you're at the risk of being womaned. Amy Schumer has tried to come back and she got womaned out again. But yeah and I think too that
the phrases they use are, "Well she gives me a weird vibe" or "I've always gotten this sort of energy or sense from her" and
it's just kind of like a polished linguistic form of bullying. Like you're being rude but you wanna have the moral high ground. So instead of saying, "Oh I
just don't like this girl," you go "She seems toxic, like
there's something about her," 'cause you don't wanna admit to yourself, I just don't like her for whatever reason. You see that too with Sydney Sweeney where I think she attend, she has conservative family members and I don't think she stated anything about her politics but the
association with that is now, Sydney Sweeney is forever
problematic, you know, deemed with this paint brush. So once you have that like check mark against your reputation, that reputation follows
you around anywhere. If anyone ever has a thread, oh you know, "What do we know about Sydney Sweeney?" That's always gonna come up forever. And people just kinda
carry this like receipt of past problems with them
if you're a celebrity. - I also think particularly
with Sydney Sweeney, it's like she's a white girl who grew up in a pretty rural area of Washington, Idaho.
- Somewhere in the south. - I feel like I could
tell you that her family, like she has pretty conservative
family members and I think if we held that standard for every person that we're friends with
too, like I wouldn't have any white friends probably. Like I kind of already know going into it that like I might not
vibe with every member of your family but that
doesn't mean you're not like a decent person. Okay, I do like this question but it would just like
be really random for me to say right now.
(both laughing) Do you think in general
PR teams of like the 2020s or late 2010s have been doing a good job to deal with this like influx
of cancellation and scandal? Okay, I just wanna clarify because I have very complicated
thoughts on cancel culture. Like I think a lot of the times usually right wing people tend to conflate what cancel culture means. And for the most part, most people who have been involved in a scandal have not been canceled in the sense where their career is over. When I talk about a cancellation, I think of a cultural cancellation. This doesn't even have to be widespread because a lot of the times
the hatred and vitriol that certain celebrities get
is very contained on Twitter or TikTok, but this is definitely still like a phenomenon
even if it's small scale because it is something
that has arisen in the age of technology and it's something that has affected a number
of different celebrities. - It's hard to tell. Sometimes
they do feel so out of touch. Like when the Sydney
Sweeney thing happened, so many people were saying, Oh she talked about paying
so much for her PR team, where are they now? And I think sometimes the PR
tactic is, what's it called? Like the the Streisand effect. Sometimes you don't
wanna address a scandal 'cause then that only makes
people hone in on it more. And it's also hard to tell
since we're so online, what is a true scandal and
then what's just a scandal because it's on our specific
For You Page on TikTok. - Right.
- So for example, my mom probably has no
idea about The Try Guys, my dad probably has no idea
that Lea Michele can't read. So there's some like
scandals and cancellations that people think are a huge
deal, but it's actually not if you pull like all of
America and who's seen movies and TV shows, it's not just our core group of people on TikTok, it's
everyone across America. - So do you think it's better, like if you're a celebrity and you got, you know say, you know,
like Sydney Sweeney, what happened to her, do you think it's better to say something and address the situation or just, you know, pretend it never happened? - I'd say there's probably a formula. I would say everyone probably
doesn't wanna address it for the first 36 hours. But then if it blows up into
something huge you decide, do I put out a tweet, do I do X, Y, Z? And it's funny how people address it on their least viewed platform. So like David Dobrik used
his second YouTube channel to address his allegations or Sydney Sweeney responded in a tweet when really all of the photos that caused this were on her Instagram. So it's funny how
celebrities are like, okay, I'll pick a medium that
a lot of people won't see but will still cover my ass and then that's how I'll apologize. - I didn't like the apology
that she did 'cause I was like, if you're gonna write an apology, like one, don't do it on Twitter and two, like I think she should
have just been like, "Oh, like I don't have these views." - Also as a woman you should
know saying relax, calm down. never makes anyone relaxed or calmed down. - Right, so you know,
- Yeah. - I wonder if like she did get guidance from a PR team to say
that and then if she did, I'm like, who are these PR people? Like how long have they
been in the industry for? Maybe they've been in it too long. Sometimes I think like people
in the industry, you know, if they're like Gen X or
like older millennials, they might not understand like
the landscape that we have today and that can end
up being a detriment to the people that they represent. - Totally, and it's also
hard to tell too what, when celebrities do something, is that because their PR
team told them to do it or was it just them? So like I imagine Sydney
Sweeney fired off that tweet herself at the party and then
I imagine Adam Levine sat down at a conference room and wrote
up a little Notes app apology for the Instagram story, but
you never know who did what. - Can you tell you think? - I think so. I think if it takes a long
time for it to come out, typically a PR team helped on it. I think Sydney Sweeney did tweet just a few hours after it happened. So I could see that coming from her. And then I think if it
also involves more people, you're gonna have a team weigh in. So anything involving
that, like Taylor Swift, Kanye West, Kim Kardashian incident, it involves so many people there's threats of lawsuits you would include people. Sydney Sweeney, it's
just her family members. So I could see her just saying
that from her gut, yeah. - From her southern heart.
- Yeah. (both laughing) But I also think like a lot
of people respond negatively to apologies if they think
that a PR team was behind it 'cause it comes off as less authentic. But then, you know, for
Sydney Sweeney's case, like people were also ragging on her for not having her PR team look over it. So like is there a sweet spot
or do you think no apology is ever gonna be good enough? - I think it's different
for different groups and I think a lot of times
people don't know what they want. There was this, she's a Russian TikToker and there was this scandal involving her where I think she said
the N word in Russian in an interview and she was saying that it was just Russian slang and other people, I obviously
don't speak the language, were saying that it wasn't
and everyone was calling for her to do an apology. So she made an apology on TikTok and I remember all of the comments saying, "Well, we won't forget,
this apology wasn't enough." And it just seems like
people's natural instinct when something goes wrong
is, "Apologize, apologize." But people don't take a beat to think, do you really want an
apology or do you wanna never see this person on the app again? 'Cause you know, it seems
morally fair of you to say, "Well, all I want is an apology." You would sound so cruel if you said, "I never wanna see your
face on this app again." But sometimes celebrities do apologize and it's never enough. But then once again, like you have all of
America into question, a lot of these people
probably don't even know about the scandals that are going on. Some people probably saw,
"Don't Worry Darling." And had no idea that Spit
or Shia LaBeouf was involved in any of it. - I wish that was me.
(both laughing) - Yeah, bit out there.
- Or I kinda don't though, I like, I love the Spit memes.
- Yeah. They were really funny. - And my opinion on that
like think he did spit but not like purposely. Like probably like a little
bit came out but not like, you know, like targeted, spit.
- He wasn't like, honking a loogie but it was
like a little dribble maybe. And he is a spitter, he spits
in his concerts all the time. - Is this verified like,
or is a blind item? - Enty, at least from "Crazy
Days And Nights" says, and it looks like this in the video, that Chris Pine's sunglasses fell in his lap and that's why he looked down. But it's more fun to believe the spit, so that's what I spread. - Yeah, see like it's also more fun to believe that Harry Styles is bald. - He's just a bald spitter.
He's like a llama, yeah. - And I think it like goes
back to one of those things where it's like, are these rumors like actually gonna hurt a
celebrity to spread them? - Yeah, Harry Styles
spitting, that's fine. All these rumors about Timothee
Chalamet having chlamydia, that's a little bit different, you know? So there's definitely a wide range. - Right, okay, I think that's all the questions I have for you, Shannon. Thank you so much for joining me today. - Thanks for having me. - I think you had like a
lot of really great insight. - Thanks.
(both laughing) - So I realized when I first recorded I didn't film a goodbye and it felt really weird
to not have the video end with some kind of closure, so here we go. Thank you guys so much for watching. Let me know in the comments what you think about celebrity gossip
scandal over the years. Also let me know if you want
more people coming in as guests for some of my longer form videos. Obviously it doesn't make
sense to have a guest for every single topic that I
talk about, but for this one, I thought it was really
fun to talk to Shannon. I think she is very smart and articulate and I was very nervous to talk to her as you can probably tell in the video. But if that is something
that you think adds to the viewing experience, I
would love to hear it, okay? Thanks for spending this
part of your day with me. I hope you have a good rest of your day and I'll see you later, bye.
