#17: On fandom

Hey there Delilah, what’s it like in New York City?

Spring has fully sprung in Buenos Aires, which feels like the equivalent of senioritis. It’s sort of a downhill tumble to the end of the year when the weather is too good to inspire motivation to stay inside and work and it’s all too easy to throw out a “let’s circle back in the new year” in response to pretty much everything.

In that vein, I’ve been enjoying my newly-granted access to a giant swimming pool (if you can’t live in a place with amenities, at least date someone who does) and soaking up as many rays as I can before feeling guilty about sun damage and premature aging.

Our collective social agenda has been buzzing with activity, but it all pales in comparison to the upcoming Pride celebration, where I hope to see every she, gay, and they (+ allies!) out on the streets defending our rights and coming together to remind the world that people are gay, Steven.

If you missed my previous newsletter about Pride in Argentina, you can check it out at the link below. I also discuss the importance of medialunas as bisexual icons, so, yeah. Enjoy!

🎃 Apropos of Nothing: I Love Gay Halloween

While local celebrations of Halloween have certainly ramped up in recent years, it will never compare to the levels of absurdity reached in the US. I miss spending weeks brainstorming and preparing clever group costumes (Forgotten Holidays, Lawn Ornaments, Celebrities That Have Been to Rehab This Year [2007]).

Luckily, as a chronically online gremlin I’ve been able to live vicariously through what’s been shared on Twitter. I know the app has devolved into a total hell pit of misery, but when it comes to #GayHalloween I just can’t look away.

💔 How Argentine Superfans Mourn: Hysteria & Humor

By now you’ve probably learned the news of the tragic and unexpected death of Liam Payne, former member of boy band One Direction, in Buenos Aires a couple of weeks ago. The troubled star met an early demise after allegedly falling from his third-floor balcony at the Casa Sur hotel in Palermo Hollywood.

WhatApp group chats and social media blew up before international media caught wind of the story, and we all suddenly found ourselves glued to our phones, listening to leaked audios from hotel employees, morbidly zooming in on photos looking for clues, and hypothesizing about what happened.

Media quickly swarmed the area, interviewing stunned fangirlies, random neighbors, and everyone in between. However, this diva really took the cake when it came to making the most of her 15 minutes:

She’s right - one day you’re just chilling, and the next you’re out buying a cinnamon roll when you hear that your idol killed himself! It really makes you think, doesn’t it?

It didn’t take long for the fans to descend upon the hotel and establish a makeshift altar honoring the memory of their dreamboat. Though One Direction’s last studio album was released in 2015, the level of devotion to - dare I say, obsession with - the group in Argentina remains as fervent as ever.

At the same time, as maladjusted young adults lacking healthy boundaries regarding parasocial relationships with celebrities shed their tears outside an upscale vegan restaurant located next to the hotel, Twitter was ablaze with memes and commentary well on the opposite side of the spectrum. The level of dark humor reached a fever pitch that night and carried through well through the rest of the week.

“Me in 40 years at some seedy retirement home telling the nurses how on October 16, 2024 Liam Payne, former member of a legendary boy band, died in Palermo.”

It was a curious contrast, of course. The tragic and untimely death of someone beloved by millions around the globe is objectively a very sad thing. The fact that it happened on Argentine soil meant that locals were going to both take ownership of it all (a strange mix of pride and conviction that the country is, in fact, relevant on the world stage) and make an endless series of jokes about the situation as a way of processing their grief.

Using humor to cope with trauma isn’t a new concept, though I do think it’s grown much more acute in our post-COVID context. When you consider how much shit Argentina has been through in the last 75 years (though some might even posit that things have pretty much been destined for crisis since independence), it’s only logical that they’d be ~ creative ~ with how they process it all.

And honestly, Argentines are damn funny. Their humor is at once basic and brilliant; they’re so quick and clever it can be hard to keep up. It’s one of my favorite things about the culture, and something that speaks to both their intelligence and their resilience.

🕊️ Top 5 Liam Payne Memes (I’m Sorry)

OK, so here’s a roundup of my favorite memes about Liam Payne. Listen, I know that it’s not funny to joke about the dead, but also it kind of is, and if we lose our sense of humor then what will be left?

There was commentary on neighborhood-specific trends:

And the current political landscape:

And of course, it wouldn’t be an Argentine meme if there weren’t mention of Boca Jrs.:

🏆 Argentine Fandom: Ever to Excel

As rabid Directioners crawled out of the woodwork after nearly a decade of dormancy - although I’d argue that the Argentine ones never really went away - I started to think about locals’ relationships to the artists and celebrities they love.

Argentines are known to be passionate, wearing their hearts on their sleeves and hyperbolizing every emotion capable of expression. Living and dying for a football match, celebrating a friend’s wedding with more enthusiasm and unbridled joy you’d ever think possible, never shutting up (not even for one second) about whatever it is that they care about. It’s a lot, yes, but it’s also kind of amazing.

It only makes sense, then, that this would apply to the realm of fandom in a similarly exponential way. What do you expect when a band or artist might visit the country once every 20 years, if at all? So much build up, so much expectation, so much dedication funneled into endless hours of playing a favorite song or album over and over and over again.

There’s a cathartic release that comes with screaming alongside thousands of other fans, belting out every word to every song. In a country wrought with economic turmoil, sociopolitical tensions, and ever-changing horizons for the future, the refuge and connection sought out via music become more vital than ever. Basically - can you blame us for being like this?

Taylor Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour has included 52 shows in the United States alone, not to mention the hundreds of other performances she’s given in the country over the course of her career.

Her three sold-out shows at River Plate’s Estadio Monumental - the first and perhaps only time she’ll perform in Argentina - mobilized our population, economy, and psyche in a way that put everyone else around the globe to shame. While 200,000 tickets were sold for these concerts, 2.8 million people remained on the waitlist - enough to fill the stadium another 40 times.

Fans camped out for more than five months to ensure prime access to the front row, staying organized with an Excel spreadsheet more sophisticated than anything I’ve ever put together at any job. Determining who was the most dedicated - and therefore deserving - was a hot button topic that morphed from Twitter meme to fully accepted part of the local lexicon.

Even the University of Buenos Aires has begun to flirt with Swiftiedom, offering a course on Taylor’s influence and impact through a literary lens.

All of this predates Taylor, of course. Argentine fandom doesn’t discriminate across generations or genres, nor does it operate within any statute of limitations.

🚀 An Incomplete & Very Brief Rundown of Argentine Fandoms

There’s the Harry Potter contingent, so notorious it’s been written about by scientific researchers.

Let’s not forget the emotional, physical, and psychological destruction that Justin Bieber has brought upon Argentina over the years. My favorite relic of the Belieber craze, though, has to be this iconic moment:

@erodamusic

y para los que no sabian… #piscis #justinbieber #justin #cronicatv #humor #justinesdepiscis

(Lucky for us, local media followed up with the superfan 11 years later (?!?!!), where we learned some hard truths about it all - like maybe he wasn’t even a fan of Justin after all?)

Argentina is home to the most die-hard fans of The Ramones that you’ll find anywhere, believe it or not. This piece (written in English, finally!) does a fantastic job of exploring the phenomenon.

In the realm of sports, it goes without saying that soccer is the end-all, be-all of Argentine fandom. My hands are starting to cramp up, so I’m going to save that for another time. But we can observe the dedication in other athletic disciplines!

Argentine Formula 1 driver Franco Colapinto’s star is certainly on the rise. At a time when everything else associated with Argentina feels like utter crap, it’s refreshing to have at least one thing to celebrate, even if it’s a bit niche. (Side note: If you don’t really “get” F1, I highly recommend the Netflix docuseries “Drive to Survive,” which showcases just how dramatic and catty those men in jumpsuits can be, and I mean that in the best way possible. A must watch!)

There are certainly more - many more - that could be added to this list. Coldplay played ten sold-out shows in 2022. Roger Waters (woof) sold out River Plate for a record-breaking 13 shows. And let’s not forget the Rolling Stones, so classically famous here that they spawned a generation of die-hards known as the rolingas.

All this talk about fandom has made me nostalgic for the days when I was a regular subscriber of SPIN magazine, ordered obscure punk CD’s by mail, and spent all of my free time making mix tapes with personalized covers.

I’ll admit that I might never understand how some people come to define their whole personalities based on their one-sided devotion to an artist that doesn’t even know they exist, but I do wholeheartedly support the idea of being unabashed when it comes to liking what you like.

The world is on fire, go ahead and make another friendship bracelet.

Until next time,

Paige

Enjoying Tutti Frutti, live in Argentina, and want to support this (and future) creative endeavors? Consider supporting the newsletter by clicking here.