She got name checked in an article in The Atlantic today.
Beware the Weepy Influencers
In my psychology practice, when tears enter the room, they have a way of cutting through the noise—all of the defenses, all of the pretenses. A client’s carefully constructed walls fall away, allowing something deep to emerge. I’ve seen this happen time and again, and it’s why for years I saw crying as one of the purest forms of vulnerability—until I discovered
crying TikTok.
The trend is exactly what you might expect: People post videos of themselves
crying (or
trying not to). Some of these videos are slickly produced; some feature moody
music; many rack up hundreds of thousands of views. These displays of vulnerability are, of course, not restricted to TikTok (whose
fate, under the new Trump administration, is
uncertain). They can also be found on YouTube, Instagram, and other apps, part of a broader online aesthetic. Influencers and celebrities strip down to what can seem like the rawest version of themselves, selling the promise of “real” emotional connection—and, not infrequently, products or their personal brand. In a post titled “
Reacting to My Sad and Lonely Videos,” the YouTube star Trisha Paytas watches old footage of herself sobbing and is moved to tears all over again; this sort of post shares space in her channel with clips in which she pitches her own
merch. On Instagram, influencers toggle between
montages of sadness and sponsored videos that show them cozily sipping
fancy tea.
The weepy confessions are, ostensibly, gestures toward intimacy. They’re meant to inspire empathy, to reassure viewers that influencers are just like them. But in fact, they’re exercises in what I’ve come to call “McVulnerability,” a synthetic version of vulnerability akin to fast food: mass-produced, easily accessible, sometimes tasty, but lacking in sustenance. True vulnerability can foster emotional closeness. McVulnerability offers only an illusion of it. And just as choosing fast food in favor of more nutritious options can, over time, result in
harmful outcomes, consuming “fast vulnerability” instead of engaging in bona fide human interaction can send people down an emotionally unhealthy path.