Unpacking Justin Bieber's (un?)popularity

So why exactly is Justin Bieber so popular? I think it's safe to say that he's loved by hoards of screaming girls at least, from the video of his arrival at Auckland airport taken 2 nights ago. At the same time there are countless facebook groups (yes I am citing facebook as a reliable source) that 'bash' him.

Many people can't see why he's so popular, what with his questionable intelligence (What's 'German'? I don't know what that means. We don't use that term in America.) and undeniable cockiness (The best thing about being famous is the girls; since I'm famous I can get any chick I want). At the same time, there are many who adore him and can't see why anyone would dislike him. So, I decided to see if I could unpack (crudely and amateurishly) exactly what kind of psychology is going on here...

Honestly, it could just be that he's a good singer who's around teenagers' age. If you look at any of the other guys who are 'hot' musicians, they're usually in their 20s and it's more like a 'dream crush' kind of thing rather than something that's actually plausible. But these girls may believe that they actually have a shot with JB because he's around our age, hence the more obsessive reactions.

But wait, teen idols in the past were never this popular. Jesse McCartney, Aaron Carter, both were 15-17 when they first became popular (and I have to stop here to add that Jesse McCartney was much MUCH hotter than JB will ever be), yet they never had screaming girls crying over them and stealing their hats. Why? Maybe people are just getting more obsessive in general. Maybe because they never did international tours so girls never got a chance to spaz as much over them. Maybe because they debuted in the time before internet communication became well connected, which is possibly a big factor for JB since he was found through youtube, and the medium that seems to be spurring hate/love is social networking sites where a lot of people gather in one place.

All that said, girls are a lot more obsessive about this than guys. REGARDLESS OF HOW HOT A GIRL IS, guys have NEVER been this obsessed with a girl. Recall twilight obsession... a lot of lovers, a lot of haters, very extremist fandom. mostly female. What is the most obsessed guys have been with anything on this scale? NEVER. Anything that came close was either megan fox (who, btw, has about 50/50 female/male ratio who think she's the hottest woman ever) or leah dizon.

Then again we must recognise that the more lovers something has, the more haters as well. It's almost like tall poppy syndrome in an indirect kind of obscure way. Basically, people start not liking something just because other people like it. Maybe in an effort to be 'different', but in doing this the whole thing blows up because you get extremist lovers and haters and a lot of namecalling and "YOUR OPINION IS STUPID" kind of things... And people come in to back up their friends' and their own opinion, leading to world war 3 over JB... no jk, but come on, it's getting ridiculous.

There is some degree of mob psychology going on here too. Think about it, one person says JB sounds like a girl and can't sing and a million do. The fact that he sounds like a girl, I'll admit, is a fact. But let's face it, he can sing. That's why he's famous. Honestly the empty insults are really quite sad; I'd bet that 99% of the people who say he can't sing can't sing even half as well as he can. JB is a good singer: He has almost perfect pitch, and can handle songs that many singers who are older than him cannot. The only thing is I feel like his voice is going to deteriorate from wearing it out so much and singing so high while he's young like Keita Tachibana's did (KT from w-inds, japanese band). Keita is still a good singer even tho he can't reach the octaves he used to be able to though, so it's not like JB will sound totally terrible after his voice breaks.

I'm not defending him, he's still cocky as and too short for the girls in his videos, but come on guys, let's not get so extreme over a kid who's our age. I doubt he cares so much about his haters, and haters breed lovers like lovers breed haters. As a bystander, I find that JB fangirls are about as annoying as JB haters. Putting someone down is a way of raising their popularity too, so let's not make such a big deal out of a guy who is, by himself, not that big anyway (pun totally intended).