Among the harrowing details of the pop star and former One Direction member Liam Payne’s death at 31 were the ample signs he needed help. Payne first auditioned for X Factor at 14 and became globally famous before his 17th birthday. Sold a gilded promise of what fame would bring, he soon found himself objectified and exploited by the music industry, the media and even his own fans.
Payne spoke with grace and honesty in interviews and on social media about the mental health and substance abuse issues he experienced both during and after his time in One Direction: his openness about these struggles added a painful dimension to the shock and grief felt by fans and onlookers after he died in Buenos Aires on 16 October. And though his death was shocking, Payne’s media presence generated a very different response while he was still alive. In recent years and months, he had been the subject of mockery for viral clips which featured him dancing erratically or interacting with fans, not seeming entirely there. Such posts circulated before he died.
This arc – from idolised teen heartthrob to left-behind, derided addict – is all too familiar. These narratives have long existed in popular culture, but have only recently been put under greater scrutiny. Over the last few years, the culture has begun to reckon with the realities of being a child star: even the supposedly lucky ones, who “make it”, often see their lives unravel in adulthood. Grim details have emerged in documentaries and memoirs, such as the re-evaluation of Britney Spears and the documentary Quiet On Set, about children’s television of the 2000s and 2010s. And, as former child influencers have begun to speak out about their experiences, there has been increased attention given to the limited legislation in place to protect young people on social media.
Across different industries, the conclusion is obvious: exposure at such a young age is a recipe for exploitation and damaging experiences that have consequences into adulthood. The brutality of fame is no secret. It’s an experience hard for most adults to manage, let alone children. And yet despite this, child stars struggling with life after fame are still seen as disposable and treated primarily as objects of ridicule. There are certainly children who have seem to have avoided the most detrimental aspects of fame (Kieran Culkin, Mara Wilson, Emma Watson, even other members of One Direction) – but for every one of these instances, hundreds more horror stories too often end in tragedy.
Considering this, we must ask: should we continue to let children become famous? Rejecting child stardom outright may seem an extreme position, but the alternative has proved to have limited justifications. The benefits – in the best and most unlikely scenario, wealth and temporary validation – hardly outweigh the costs. And consider how little the culture has progressed, even with the ample conversations and supposed awareness we now have around the pitfalls of fame. In an age where we loudly proclaim to “learn” from the mistakes of the Nineties and Noughties, and insist on “being kind” online, child stars are still mistreated by industries, the culture at large and their own fans. I don’t know any sane adult who would relinquish the children in their own lives to the same system, no matter the promised rewards. Of course, though, sane adults are rarely the ones surrounding children in the entertainment industry – and yet, they are the ones who claim they can be relied on to keep these children safe.
A better solution would be to fundamentally change how we treat famous people, and drain the culture of celebrity of its toxicity. In such a world, talented children could act, sing and dance to audiences of millions without extreme, life-altering repercussions. But this seems at best naively optimistic, and at worst an impossible fantasy. In the meantime, we are sending children into a dangerous industry with little to no protection, then lamenting the predictable results. Until we want to seriously contend with how fame warps the children exposed to it – rather than pay lip service to its harms and carry on, more or less, as we always have – then we can expect more lives lost to this false promise.
