When fans become “stans”

Being a complete fan of an artist is not new. There were fainting spells or riots in front of the Beatles, Elvis Presley or One Direction. Even Jesus Christ had 12 devoted followers, who would surely have fought to enter his top 8 friends on MySpace.

What has changed with social networks is the conversion of these measured and harmless fans into extremely motivated and invested fans, who we call “stans”. A stan is a convinced, politicized and hyperactive fan, who will defend his favorite star even on his deathbed. No kidding.

In the United States, the communities of stans, which often come together on the X network, even have names. There’s Beyoncé’s BeyHive, Nicki Minaj’s Barbz, Lady Gaga’s Little Monsters, BTS’ Army and Taylor Swift’s famous Swifties.

And these influential stans carry weight in the popular culture industry. When Justin Timberlake launched his new single Selfishon January 25, the stans of his ex-girlfriend Britney Spears strongly encouraged their armies to “stream” the song Selfish by Britney, an obscure piece taken from her album Fatal Womanpublished in 2011.

Result: the old song Selfish Britney Spears hot on the heels of new song Selfish by Justin Timberlake on iTunes and Spotify. High-level “trolling”, as we like it.

I specify here that Britney Spears revealed in her book The woman in me that she aborted, around twenty years ago, a child of Justin Timberlake, who had no interest in becoming a father. Protective, Britney’s stans did not digest this revelation. And we’re not kidding about a Britney stan, OK?

“The stans understood how the game is played game of fame. They know how algorithms work. They not only become fans, but they also mobilize resources to ensure that their artist is treated well and is safe. They offer unwavering support,” explains Jean-Michel Berthiaume, specialist in popular culture and doctor in semiology from the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM).

Word stan officially entered the Oxford Dictionary in 2017. It refers to the title of the song Stan by Eminem (in a duet with Dido), which told the story of a fan in complete delirium because his favorite rapper did not respond to any of his letters. The music video, filmed in 2000, ended in a massacre, as Stan killed his pregnant wife by committing suicide behind the wheel of his car. Very happy, all that.

The negative connotation attached to the term stan fades with the years. Yes, there are toxic and overzealous stans, who threaten death and intimidate the detractors of their beloved popstar. But they remain a minority.

Ordinary stans do not appreciate extreme stans and ban them, recalls Jean-Michel Berthiaume, of the UQAM Media School.

Quebec artists of course have many stans, whose ascendancy does not rival that of their equivalents in the United States or South Korea. It’s strength in numbers that gives stans their power. It is this critical mass that allows them to influence the charts, in particular.

Here, singer Roxane Bruneau has a large group of stans, the Bruno’z, formerly called the Cocos. And we’re not kidding the Bruno’z, as I discovered after publishing a column that criticized their idol, champion of dubious gags in his chair. coach has The voice.

For several days, the Bruno’z flooded me with messages to the aid of the 33-year-old singer-songwriter. Like: “stop picking on Roxanne, you won’t feel good about yourself my dear”. Or again: “they don’t care about your opinion on Roxanne Bruneau, she doesn’t judge you”.

Nothing too nasty or threatening, I’ve seen a lot worse. This indestructible devotion even has something touching. To increase the pressure a notch, Roxane Bruneau’s stans also launched an online petition so that I lose my job as a columnist at The Press, petition which was signed by four people, at last count. Stans of Roxane, unite! You still have time to kick me out of my job.

The funniest thing is that Roxane Bruneau played, at the beginning of December, a version of herself in the daily series Indefensible of VAT. Her popular singer character, Louna Rose, was being harassed by a cuckold stan, who would break into her condo to sniff her clothes. The stan in question, Mylène Kirouac (Rebecca Vachon), ended up kidnapping and torturing her own lawyer Inès (Nour Belkhiria), with whom she had fallen in love. A little Tuesday at the office, that is.

Angry stans, who descend into intimidation and violence, give bad press to moderate stans. Because being a stan, basically, comes from noble feelings like admiration and respect. It’s like displaying a badge of honor, earned after hours and hours of activism on X.

And as long as it doesn’t turn into an obsessive fiasco like the crazy fan ofIndefensible, no need to call the police. Or Leo Macdonald.