Performative Influencers

I just saw a few male influencers publicly “confess” to taking steroids while simultaneously shaming others who do. And it made me think: how do people who are objectively not great at their own craft still manage to convince themselves that the craft is their identity?

But then, when I look back at everything he’s ever said and done, it all clicks. Of course that persona was built on performance. Of course the contradictions were baked in. None of it was grounded in consequence.

I said this yesterday: when a performative person meets me, it’s like they’ve seen a ghost. They genuinely can’t process it. They either go silent or they try to diminish — and, as they’re now discovering, neither of those responses does anything to someone with temporal range. If anything, it’s just energy. And someone who can switch in and out of timelines at will has a different bandwidth entirely.

I even pointed out in my group chats that the tell was obvious: even his the steroids influencers talking points were misaligned. And one of his peer influencers actually shows more authenticity because, at the very least, he brings original perspectives. He says things you just wouldn’t have thought about — for example, that Fall and Winter are the seasons for men, while Spring and Summer are the seasons for women. That the seasons amplify the natural cues of each sex, which is why they feel so different. He also talks about how men gain advantages over time if they do specific things — and since most don’t, that’s exactly what creates the separation.

Originality is a tell.