Lauren Jauregui has defended Fifth Harmony fans who got riled up Monday by a tweet denouncing “stan culture.”
“Not ppl tryna come for the harmonizers…. good luck!,” the singer tweeted.
In a tweet about Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk supposedly banning “all stan & spam accounts,” Benjamin Enfield of Now Hip-Hop News wrote: “Stans are a huge problem for artists. Take fifth Harmony for example. Lots of retweets. Low sales. Couldn’t sell out tours. Supporting artists via retweets isn’t supporting artists.”
Fifth Harmony fans, known as Harmonizers, were quick to react – and Jauregui had their backs.
“I (we) love you all forever for being such a monumental part of making our dreams come true,” she tweeted. “(Y’all are shady & messy but let’s not pretend y’all were the only fandom with this energy at the time). we also all grew up so much together and have evolved as humans past that era I feel like too and also!!!
"You were FEIRCE, LOYAL, PRESENT, & dedicated that was the very much truth. People underestimate the slow build of a consistent fan base. We were all moving for 5 years before WFH.”
Jauregui added: “Ppl ride the bandwagon when the number one enters the chat and the charts validate hard work (finally) but the harmonizers (all the fandoms tbh) were there every step of the way and continue to be and while yes, there are toxic behaviors we could all do without about Stan Culture (imma write a whole anthropological dissertation book style s**t about it one day I promise) I’m very grateful for the ppl who show up for art and people’s dreams like that. Very very grateful. Anyway! Love you!”
Enfield went on to opine: “Some stans are cool tho. Some are racist. Some harass. Some bully. & some are a danger to themselves.
“Stans are not fans. Fans actually buy products & have jobs. Stans are kids on the internet who have issues.”
The word “stan” was added to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary in 2019 as both a noun and a verb. (The Oxford English Dictionary added it two years earlier.) It is described as an “often disparaging” slang word for “an extremely or excessively enthusiastic and devoted fan.”
The word comes from Eminem’s 2000 track about an obsessed fan, portrayed in the "Stan" video by Canadian actor Devon Sawa.