Lila Rossi: A case where the obsessive fangirl goes too far.
The more advanced social media becomes, the more glad I am that I was able to outgrow my fangirl phase. It was so embarrassing I cringe at the thought of it. In this day and age, with social media, the obsession we as a society have with celebrities has gone from bad to worse. We have too much access to them indirectly. I am old enough to remember when you only heard about famous people outside of their work during interviews and magazine coverage. Now, you can open Instagram and see what celebrities are up to. Celebrity culture has gotten more out of hand because of this access. We like to laugh and giggle about those obsessed with people who have no idea they exist, but it’s no longer funny to a certain extent. A real person is suffering from the actions caused by a fan who’s too obsessive.
Every so often, there's a story of a public figure stalked by an obsessive fan who did not understand boundaries. I used this as an example because her story breaks my heart, but the singer Selena lost her life because of an obsessive fan. Selena was friendly towards this fan, so they took her kindness as a weakness and began stealing money from her. When Selena put her foot down with the fan’s behavior, the fan felt betrayed when they were clearly in the wrong. The fan's obsession with Selena got the worst of them when Selena made it obvious she no longer wanted anything to do with them; they killed Selena because of the hurt they felt.
As I have watched Miraculous Ladybug since high school, so many thoughts and opinions have shifted because I’ve changed. I, too, used to be obsessed with famous people and played into celebrity culture, and I am thankful I have strayed away from it. I thought that if I weren’t on the levels of Selena’s killer of obsession, I was fine, but nope, it was an issue. Still, as I move further and further away from my past self, I can finally start to see that obsessive fangirl behavior with a character in Miraculous, Lila Rossi. I never liked Lila; I find her unbearable. Because I disliked her so much, it was hard for me to pay attention to her scenes. As I got around to looking and listening to her, I realized something: Lila Rossi is not much different than a stan Twitter personality regarding her interactions with Adrien Agreste, a famous model, and influencer in the series.
I have developed a theory that Lila may have followed Adrien before the timeline we see within the series. Adrien is famous worldwide; while some people have no idea who he is (like the main character of the series didn't know he existed until he was in her class), overall, he can not go anywhere without being recognized by someone. When we first meet Lila in the series, she’s talking to Adrien. When I realized that Lila’s character wouldn’t exist if it were not for Adrien, I started to take note of all the odd things Lila did in relation to him.
Lila did not go to their school until Adrien did. Out of all the classes for their grade level, she ended up in Adrien’s class. We have seen in the series that Lila can lie her way to get the things she wants, and it would not be shocking if she came up with a lie about why she should be in the same class as Adrien.
Lila convinced Adrien to let her come to his home.
Lila was snooping around Adrien’s bedroom when he let her inside.
Lila follows Adrien and his friends around.
Lila got herself a modeling job to get closer to Adrien.
To get closer to Adrien, Lila started working with his father.
Lila is a stalker. She’s the kind of stalker that people don’t take too seriously until it goes too far: the crazy obsessive fangirl.
It’s evident that Adrien is not interested in Lila, but she continues to push her way into his circle by contacting his family. Does that not freak any of you guys out? The existence of Lila in Paris is because of Adrien; she came from Italy! It is a bit jarring to me that Lila’s mother was willing to move her and her daughter to another country; then again, Lila lies to her mother. Hence, she probably came up with an excuse for why she wanted to go to school in France, and it so happens to be the school that the famous person she’s obsessed with attends. Lila’s mother may be in on her schemes, but at the same time, she does not pay much attention to her daughter. Lila’s household is a grey area because we do not know much about her relationship with her mother.
As much as I dislike how Adrien was home-schooled for so long because of his modeling career (that he shouldn’t have), I understood why he was. I know why child stars are homeschooled and why celebrities who are in college are strictly getting an online education. It is dangerous to be a public figure, and people know where you attend school. At my high school, there was a situation with some people who had big followings on social media, and people threatened to come up to the school to hurt them because they posted what school they attended online. I have gotten DMS from people who do not attend the same university as me but live close by, wanting to meet up at my school. Going off the Instagram pages for the characters, Adrien and his friends made it explicitly clear what school they attend, along with the news reporting what the students at the school are up to. It’s not shocking how she figured out what school he was attending because of this; because she was obsessed with him, she used that to get closer to him.
Celebrities do not know yall. It would be one thing if Adrien had a meet and greet for his fans and people to attend, but this isn’t that. It's normal to go to concerts, meet and greets, panels, conventions, and other events where a public figure has made clear that they will be making an appearance. But it is not customary to follow around and try to get in touch with a celebrity’s family and friends to get close to them. Stop following around public figures when they are out running errands, and quit sneaking pictures of them when they are out having dinner. Many of us have an obsessive fangirl phase, but it’s best to outgrow it. If you don’t outgrow it, you could end up being as bad as Lila and Selena’s killer.