Recently, pop superstar Demi Lovato relapsed into her drug addiction, which she revealed to fans through her heartbreaking new song "Sober," and now news has come out that she has been hospitalized for an apparent drug overdose.
News of this has been dominating social media for the past few days. As a fan of her myself, tons of friends have texted me about it, asking my opinion on the issue. The news has certainly made its rounds across the media.
And as all things do on the internet, Demi's overdose has already been turned into memes. All of these memes are incredibly insensitive. For example, there is a meme with a caption telling fans to light a candle in prayer for Demi with the image of a candle below a spoonful of heroin.
Now, I understand that when you're in the limelight, you open yourself up to criticism. However, making jokes and memes about anybody's hardship shouldn't be acceptable. This includes celebrities' struggles. Generally, people accept that bullying each other is wrong, but forget that celebrities are real people too and don't deserve to be made fun of for their worst moments.
As someone who's been a fan of Demi Lovato for years (and seen her documentary "Simply Complicated," which is free on YouTube), I'm well aware of her life-long struggles with bipolar disorder, eating disorders, drug addiction, and self-harm. I'm aware of this because she has made no effort to hide it. In fact, she's incredibly open about her struggles, constantly talking about them during interviews and advocating for anti-bullying charities.
In fact, I have immense respect for her being so open about her mental health issues since she came out about all of them before it was "cool" or "mainstream" to talk about mental health. She came out with the fact that she has bipolar disorder years ago, back when admitting to having mental health problems could have very negatively impacted her career. And despite this, she rose to superstar status in the music world, inspiring millions with messages about confidence and strength.
This is why it pains me so much to see people belittle and make fun of her recent relapse. Imagine surviving bullying, abuse, severe mental health issues, and addiction, being sober for six years, then relapsing into a drug addiction. That's hard enough when you're a private individual. But when you're a public figure, your entire life and all your mistakes are out for the world to scrutinize. Imagine 99% of the people you pass on the street knowing about your darkest moments and some of them making fun of them.
No one deserves to have their problems exploited for some cheap laughs at a meme.
It's hurtful and no one deserves that kind of treatment. When it comes down to it, her life is her own, even though it is readily available to the world to comment on and scrutinize. So show some basic human decency and let her recover in peace without attacking her.