Everyone has their celebrity obsession with posters, CDs, and, sometimes, creepy shrines kept under beds. No harm, no foul. But some mega fans will do everything they can to get to the celebrity they are pining after; these are the stalkers, the people who break into celebrities’ houses, and those who will even attack their hero. When the famous sign onto the world of fame, they sign onto the dangers of obsession and must also be responsible for their own safety.
With the internet and social media, more and more celebrities are using location tags for where they are and even posting their home location to the public. By not taking into account the risks, many fall victim to swatting, home invasions, theft, and murder when the wrong person feels the need to pay their hero a visit. Musicians John Lennon and Christina Grimmie were killed by no fault of their own. Lennon was leaving his home when he was shot down by Mark David Chapman on Dec. 8, 1980 and Grimmie was shot by Kevin James Loibl while signing autographs on Jun. 10, 2016. Their tragic deaths have gone down in vain because other celebrities let fans swarm them, including Jake Paul, a past Disney star and vlogger, who allows hoards of teenage girls outside of his Team 10 House.
There have been no crimes against Jake Paul as of yet, but allowing anyone to enter his house will lead to his inevitable doom. Sharing his home address online has not only been a danger to himself, but to his neighbors who did not want their location to be known. A concerned neighbor who asked to stay anonymous reported to KTLA that their neighborhood has become a war zone when this preteen idol came to town.
“LAPD was called there 32 times in five days,” a neighbor of the star said. “But that gives you kind of a glimpse into what we have to deal with. It’s just a bad situation.”
Kim Kardashian was tied up and robbed at gunpoint in the Parisian hotel Sky Penthouse on Oct. 3, 2016. Police believe that the three robbers had pretended to be paparazzi in Paris to be able to tail Kardashian back to the hotel where they stole $9 million dollars worth of jewelry. If she had not publically posted the 12 pictures of every place she went to that day, maybe this horrible mess could have been avoided.
Not all obsessions can be physically harming, but they still horrify celebrities. Lukasz Jakobriak, a Polish man, built a fake set of the Ellen Degeneres Show and hired a fake Ellen to interview him in the hopes that the real host would be flattered by watching it. In the ‘interview,’ Lucasz talked about how he tracks down famous celebrities, such as Lady Gaga, finds their flight or private car, and makes sure he is either sitting next to them or gets a chance to talk to them. Not only were the people who watched the video creeped out, but even the Fake Ellen left a negative comment.
Being the victim of any crime is not the victim’s fault, but there are ways situations such as this can be avoided when celebrities think about how public social media can affect them. In this big, bad world, many celebrities cannot always be all powerful against the extremities of their fans.