Doja Cat: On Borrowed Time

Photo By Noam Galai// Getty images

Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini, better known as the wildly popular artist ‘Doja Cat,’ has been under fire for seemingly switching up on her fans, but more recently for expressing that she feels ‘free’ for losing over 500k followers.

On June 24, Doja Cat took to Threads, writing, “My fans don’t name themselves sh*t,” followed by, “If you call yourself a ‘Kitten’ or f*cking ‘Kittenz,’ it means to get a job and help your parents with the house,” which got people, especially fans, upset. The post sparked a back and forth with many Doja Cat fan pages and other fans; one even posted, “And we don’t know YOU. but we have supported you through thick and thin. Mind you, you’d be nothing if it weren’t for us…miss high school drop out.” This back and forth continued until Doja and many large fan pages deactivated their threads accounts. After this occurred, people hijacked this situation and dumbed it down to simply a conversation about parasocial relationships.

Parasocial Relationships are ‘one-sided relationships, where one person extends emotional energy, interest, and time, and the other party, the persona, is completely unaware of the other's existence.

It’s one thing to no longer resonate with your past work or past self. There is validity to wanting to explore different genres, appeal to a new audience, and create a new image for yourself. But there is a clear difference between that and being rude, entitled, arrogant, and inconsistent. To express to fans so eloquently to “get off their phones and get a job” is appalling. She validly says ‘that she doesn’t owe [her fans] anything,’’. And that ‘she doesn’t love [her fans] because she doesn’t know them,’ it just doesn’t make too much sense when she has expressed numerous times that she does love her fans and is very grateful for them, and wouldn’t even have this career, to begin with, without them. While, yes, she doesn’t know each of her fans enough to love them, at least recognize what they have done for you.

Since this drama has ensued, she has since released a song called “Paint the Town Red.” Listeners to the song point out the line, “B*tch, I said what I said. I’d rather be famous instead. I let all that get to my head,” which seems to mock the recent situations, leading people to believe this was all a big PR stunt. It’s even more strange when in a past series of tweets that seemed to denounce the ‘mediocre pop’ she’s been known for, she comes out with that song that sounds like ‘planet her leftovers,’ as one TiK ToK listener claims. As ex-fans have stated, It’s weird to be going on a tirade to deflect from your allegedly problematic partner, your flip-flop image on your career, and repeats of strange and overall off-putting behavior. Current fans continue to wish Doja Cat nothing but peace and love during this time.