Influencer’s Impact on OCSA Students

Rajsi Rana

To the world, celebrities are both the most admired and hated. To the average person, their day consists of being stalked by paparazzi, then returning to their mansions, all while wearing designer clothes. And yet, we are infatuated with these people who seem to be almost artificial. Influencers seem to be the opposite of this. They show their day-to-day lives in vlogs uploaded on Youtube, and they experience regular things: school, work, chores, and more. Many of them try to be “raw and real” in their videos, which often translates into filming mundane things, posting them on social media or Youtube, and getting thousands of views and likes. 

Emma Chamberlain, one of the youngest and most popular influencers with more than 13 million followers on Instagram and more than 10 million subscribers on Youtube, is well known for this. Her videos are described as “relatable.” The clips consist of her doing regular, everyday things, such as grocery shopping, cooking, going on walks, and feeding her cats. To many people, she does not do anything differently than everyone else. 

Yet, her self-made title as an influencer is truly upheld through her actions. Her clothing decisions have set trends: one of the most notable being the puffy brown jacket, which could be seen across campus on OCSA students. Audio clips from her podcast are often reposted on TikTok, where they go viral. Her mindset and style influence thousands of young people every day.

In addition to that, Emma Chamberlain also often discusses mental health on her platforms, which can emotionally support her viewers who struggle with the same things as she does. 

Mental health is one of the most significant topics that influencers advocate for and speak on. This has led to multiple mental health practices becoming more trendy and well-known. Hobbies such as journaling, exercises like yoga and going on walks, and creatively expressing yourself through art are all discussed and done by influencers. Many viral TikToks feature routines which include a few, if not all of these activities.

Often, influencers portray themselves as down-to-earth individuals with whom we can find similarities. Although this can help many students with their struggles, it can also lead to harmful things becoming a trend. 

During this past summer, one popular trend which many influencers participated in was ¨clothing hauls.¨ With the pandemic, everyone began to spend more time online than ever before, including online shopping. Online stores such as Shein became very popular because of their cheap cost and widespread popularity by influencers. Many would post Shein clothing hauls, where they showed off the numerous clothes purchased for hundreds of dollars. This led to followers and viewers purchasing a large number of clothes as well.

Although the specificities of Shein’s business practices, including its labor policies, have not been officially disclosed to consumers, many active users on TikTok speculate that in order to keep up with trends at their fast pace, unethical practices are performed in their clothing factories, such as using child labor. 

Many high school students, with limited money to spend on clothes, buy from Shein. Although this is not a bad thing in itself, influencers who promote overbuying and overspending are.

Influencers impact our generation's clothing, mindset and slang. OCSA students around campus wear clothes that have become trendy and fashionable by influencers, have ideas and goals first suggested to them by influencers, and say expressions coined by influencers.