One of the most toxic and horrifying things I see on social media is the amount of parasocial interactions going on.

Social media has curated this kind of delusional emotional proximity to people whose online personas are so far removed from their personal lives

I genuinely don’t think I’ll ever understand. Especially when I think we all know that we post pretty things. We post the highlight reels. Other people; famous people, athletes, politicians, everyone— they all do the same.

But the toxicity of parasocial interactions, to my mind, occurs when someone takes on the imagined emotional burden of needing to defend someone who literally has no clue they exist. Someone who is unaffected by their existence.

I question what type of meaningful interactions and support systems are missing from their lives that they’re willing to project this imagined closeness onto an idealized personality.

Don’t get me wrong. I cried when Bowie died and listened to his albums all that day. But I think that’s very different than fighting in the comments on twitter presuming to know what this or that celebrity would feel about a certain thing.

Even more horrifying is when people start doing that same thing after a celebrity passes away. The psychology behind parasocial interactions speaks to a culture that fears true intimacy and closeness with those around us.

In a parasocial relationship we never have to be accountable for our actions but the famous party always has to be accountable for theirs. Parasocial interactions allow people to emotionally victimize themselves. We as a culture desperately need to step away from the screen.

Behaviors from parasocial interactions bleed over into our actual relationships. When we’re called upon to do the hard work of connecting to another person with all their flaws— will we be able to do it with grace? Will we be able to hold ourselves accountable for our own flaws?