On Monday, billionaire actress and singer Selena Gomez made an absolute fool of herself when she posted a headline-grabbing video on her Instagram account. She'd filmed herself crying to the point that she could barely speak over what I'm assuming was the fact that Donald Trump has, as he said he would, deported hundreds of criminals since taking office.
"All my people are getting attacked, the children. I don’t understand. I’m so sorry, I wish I could do something but I can’t. I don’t know what to do. I’ll try everything, I promise," she said in the video that she has since deleted.
NEW: Selena Gomez has emotional
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) January 27, 2025
breakdown over Trump's deportation policy, says all her people are “getting attacked.”
Here comes the celebrity meltdowns again. Some things never change.
The 32-year-old said she will “try everything” to help illegal immigrants.
“All my people… pic.twitter.com/FePvwHmoDR
Gomez, who was born in the United states to parents who were born in the United states, calls herself a "proud third-generation American-Mexican" because her paternal grandparent came here in the 1970s. She's also been slammed by some of her left-wing fans in the past for her sort of drive-by activism.
Anyway, while her comments on the now infamous video were pretty asinine, I'm not here to call her out for this. She's allowed to have her beliefs. I might recommend that she watch a little less MSNBC, but that's not the point I came here to make.
The point I came here to make is: Why in the hell do people film themselves crying and post it online? I posted Collin Rugg's version of Selena's video because he actually mentions this on his X page. When you video yourself crying, you can easily just stop filming an delete it. But no, people like Gomez are taking time to go a step further and post it online.
People filming themselves crying is a modern phenomenon that doesn’t get talked about enough.
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) January 27, 2025
Think of all the steps it takes to cry, film it, edit it, and then post it.
There are so many opportunities not to post it, but they do it anyway.
I won't keep picking on Gomez because it's not just celebrities, and it's not a new phenomenon. It's not just young people. And it's not just crazy liberals who can't handle the results of elections.
I won't mention her name, but a few years, a fairly popular YouTuber had a baby who was a few months old, and he was found unresponsive around Christmas. I didn't follow this woman, but her story lit up social media, and people who I know who did follow her and even some celebrities were talking about how heartbreaking it was. And it was terrible. The family eventually took the baby off life support and donated his organs to other families with sick children.
When I visited this woman's Instagram page, I was met with something I found absolutely disgusting. In the midst of losing her infant son, she'd taken pictures of herself sitting on the bathroom floor in the hospital crying like it was some sort of scene in a movie. They'd been edited — filters applied — and posted with a long caption in which she'd tagged a popular retailer saying she needed to buy a funeral dress from them.
Look, I get that people grieve and handle death in different ways. I'm not going to knock anyone for that. But I can't imagine my child lying in his deathbed, and I'm worried about taking pictures for the 'gram and hoping to get sponsors.
There is another lady I follow on Instagram because she gives great advice on a topic that interests me. She's been through some tough stuff lately, and I feel bad for her, but she's also taken to just posting videos of herself crying while talking about all the challenges she's faced over the last few months. From what I understand, it's even worse over on TikTok, but I don't use that platform, so I don't know.
I did a little research on this topic, and I found a few different ideas. Some media outlets tried to paint it as some sort of positive carthic thing that benefits mental health, but I just don't see it that way at all. If anything, I see it more as virtue signaling. Siobhan Robbins of Sky News appears to agree:
However, my gut reaction to someone staring down the barrel of a camera to talk to strangers as they're crying their eyes out is that it feels insincere.
Bursting into tears is a natural release for the body and mind, it's a basic human reaction.
However, if you have the presence of mind to pick up a camera and start filming that emotion, I feel the act changes from being natural to theatrical.
In short, it seems a little fake.
I also think so many people are used to watching these so-called "influencers" and others on social media offer curated glimpses into their daily lives that many don't even stop to question the authenticity behind those crocodile tears. It's almost like watching a movie. And I think the influencers and people who post so much on social media are so used to attention that they'll often stop at nothing to get it. And that's what it all boils down to: attention.
As Chris Rock said in his most recent comedy special, "Selective Outrage":
They say we're addicted to opioids, but opioids are not the biggest addiction in America. No, not even close, man. The biggest addiction in America is attention. That's right. We are addicted to attention, can't get enough attention — fiending for likes. We used to want love, now we just want likes. Posting up pathetic pictures... fiending for attention, addicted to attention.
When I think about that and posts like the one Gomez made this week, it all kind of makes sense. And I won't be the least bit surprised if this gross trend doesn't become even more popular over the next four years. I can see it now: celebrities and influencers taking to their social media accounts to film themselves crying over whatever lies they've been fed — or whatever lies they're attempting to peddle — about Trump and the current GOP.
But at the end of the day, if they really wanted to make a change, they'd put down their phones, leave their ivory towers, and go actually do something to help whatever cause it is they're pretending to be so upset about. Anything less than that just tells me that Robbins and Rock are right.
