Collapsing Boundaries

In an austere warehouse, a very online political pundit sits at a small desk. Sometimes it’s a conservative — Candace Owens, say — and sometimes it’s a progressive, like Mehdi Hasan. No matter who it is, the format is the same: The star is surrounded by a mob of 20 people who rush the desk, vying for the chance to argue against the professional rhetoricians over inflammatory proposals like “the sexual revolution has devalued women and made them infinitely less happy” or “Donald Trump’s plan for Gaza is ethnic cleansing.” Over the course of about 90 minutes, everyone in the circle gets a go.

Officially, there are no winners in “Surrounded,” the YouTube debate series. But millions of viewers delight in watching people just like them confront famous ideological foes. The videos aren’t really about changing anyone’s mind. They’re about the electrical charge that emerges between one star of the digital commentariat and a crowd of normies.

The staged intermingling of stars and their audiences is a staple of modern celebrity culture. But a new type of interaction is rising — the one-versus-all stunt. It promises fans more than just autographs or selfies. The fan who wonders if the masculinist influencer Andrew Tate would consider him a “Top G” now has the chance to fight Tate, literally. The subscriber to Bonnie Blue’s OnlyFans videos can now pay her to, well, live out what he has seen: One day this year, she had sex with more than 1,000 fans in a London apartment.

The one-against-many stunts physically embody interactions once confined to bytes and screens. They dramatize interplay between creators and the nameless masses to whom they owe their success. Today’s newsletter is about those interactions and what they mean.

A new connection

For decades, the star-fan relationship went in one direction. The average person developed a parasocial connection with stars, imagining one-sided friendships. Fan clubs organized around exclusive knowledge. Gossip magazines purported to show celebrities who dined and shopped “just like us.” Reality TV churned out an inexhaustible supply of everyday personas for audiences to obsess over, laugh about, compare themselves with.

The internet — and in particular the advent of social media — blazed new pathways, giving audiences a way to kick over the rope cordoning off celebrities from everyone else. You could talk to anyone who had a Twitter account. Celebrities responded to Instagram comments. Today, content creators are in a relationship with their fans, and their work is designed to feel that way. That’s why talk shows that mimic the intimacy of close friendship dominate podcast charts.