Liam Payne’s Death. Why are so many young stars biting the dust all of a sudden?
March 25, 2015. The worst day for being a One Direction fan aka a Directioner. The day Zayn Malik left to pursue a solo career and 1D became four. Or at least so it was until…
Fast-forward to almost a decade later. I was casually eating dinner when the evening news dropped the bombshell: Liam Payne Dead 1993–2024. My mom audibly gasped at the headline and so did I but the inner teenager in me refused to believe it was real so I did a quick Google search and lo and behold, it was very much a reality. Complete and utter shock was all I could feel in that moment, it was like my teenage years have been ripped away from me. I have been a massive Directioner since I was 14 and although I don’t keep up that much with their solo endeavors now I still very much consider myself a devoted fan. I listened to every new One Direction album religiously back in high school and college as well as owned any poster and magazine cover of theirs that I could afford. I would even delay doing my schoolwork just so I could watch a new music video of 1D’s that dropped, listen to any new singles that were released without warning, as well as schedule a time to borrow the TV just to watch their late-night interviews. I even wrote generic fanfiction about them. Even though I only met them online, I have developed genuine connections with several fellow Directioners. But being the naive teenage girl that I was, little did I know that the very idols that made me happy were actually suffering behind closed doors while providing this quality entertainment.
A description of Liam James Payne: Born on August 29, 1993 in Wolverhampton, England, he was widely regarded by the One Direction fandom as “Daddy Direction” due to his image as the mature, sensible “leader” of the band and being the spokesperson in any group interviews. He has had the longest career out of all the 1D boys. He auditioned for the X-Factor in 2008 at the tender age of 14 but failed to make it to finals then again 2 years later at age 16 in 2010 where he finally succeeded and thus One Direction was born. His solo career has been the least talked about since the group parted ways in 2015. He has a 7 year old son named Bear. Liam has never really been my favorite member of One Direction. I was always more of a Niall girl, sometimes a Harry girl. But I was well aware that they weren’t One Direction if there weren’t 5, which became increasingly apparent with Zayn’s departure, even when he started to bite the hand that feeds him. He was arguably the most problematic member of the band: abused his girlfriends (his fans have even blamed his ex for his death in a classic misogynistic move), had a child out of wedlock, was too busy with his career to take care of said child, did interviews while visibly drugged, coasted on the other members’ success (mainly Harry’s), bad mouthed his other members despite being the least commercially successful in the band, has been suspected of being homophobic and biphobic and I certainly won’t defend that. But this is most definitely a time I can separate the artist from the art, especially because his band’s music made my adolescence even more fun. This takes us back to my point: how is it that so many of our teen idols gave up their own childhoods just so we could enjoy ours and it cost them their own sanities in the process, if not their own lives?
Let’s take a look at the K-Pop industry for instance. They are known for being incredibly cutthroat with their young idols, making them train at an early age and then debut when they probably haven’t even finished school yet. They hold them to such a high standard that if they so much as do something even remotely adult like dating or getting a tattoo, it is considered a scandal. They are expected to uphold a clean and sanitized image at all times, even though there are very few idols who have went against that standard and have faced harsh criticism for it, an example being former f(x) member Sulli, who gained both positive and negative attention for her outspoken persona, something not seen in many female K-Pop idols, who are expected to be sweet, cutesy, and demure at all times. The Korean public has disliked her for it and all the negativity led to her suicide at the age of just 25. Then there were the untimely deaths of Moonbin, Jonghyun, Lee Sun-kyun, Goo Hara, and many others not too long ago. Even worse is that mental health is still very much stigmatized in South Korea. BTS are arguably the biggest stars in Korea at the moment, even with most of their members fulfilling their military service, and all the pressure’s on them so who knows if one of them could meet their inevitable fate in the near future? Perhaps Mr. Payne’s passing should serve as a cautionary tale to the Korean entertainment industry, notwithstanding his checkered past.
It is rather ironic to know how many of our childhood idols were making themselves miserable just to make us happy. Especially if they became celebrities really young, long before their brains could fully develop and they could discover their identities. At the end of the day, Liam Payne was a deeply troubled man who needed help, and no amount of luxury and wealth could fix that. While there’s no excusing what he did, he entered this cutthroat world too young and has had people around him telling him how great he is ever since that he didn’t have much time to grow and develop as a person, especially with the amount of time he had to spend away from his loved ones to focus on his career. My honest opinion is that stars under the age of 18 need to be more protected behind the scenes, their parents should accompany them at all times, only if they’re not greedy stage parents that is, or cut their working hours to give them more time to rest to avoid violating child labour laws (there’s a reason fictional teenagers are always played by 20–30 year old actors!). We have lost far too many promising young stars to the jaws of Hollywood and not much seems to be changing even now in this day and age of focusing on mental health. Going back to Liam, I never would have thought he would be one of those people but here we are. Besides, the signs were there that he wasn’t well. He definitely had his demons but he should have thought of the family, friends, bandmates, and very young son he left behind. But ultimately, fame was just a prison to him and he felt that this was the only escape, no matter how many perks came with it. Regardless, I still owe it to all five members for making my youth memorable and will choose to focus on the positive. It just turns out that stardom isn’t for everyone.
