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Payne has been offside with much of the 1D fan base for years, for what many perceived as arrogance and a lack of respect for other band members (he later retracted some comments blaming frustrations with his own career).
In fact, the TikTok that Scott was watching was a negative one: suggesting Payne had tried to steal the spotlight with fans at Niall Horan’s recent concert (a bandmate he said he had not spoken to in some time).
“He’s been a bit of an oddball. He’s done some questionable things, supposedly … But if someone becomes even the slightest bit problematic, people are very quick to hop on the bandwagon of hate, which kind of sucks,” Scott said.
Dr Georgia Carroll, who has been a 1D superfan since she discovered them on Tumblr at age 17 and more recently wrote her University of Sydney PhD on celebrity fan communities, said many fans aren’t totally sure how to feel as things have been “complicated lately”.
“[Some] have been grieving the idea of him for a while, but you never thought you would actually have to grieve him,” Carroll said.
“Liam was never my favourite. I was always a Niall and a Harry girl. But he obviously was such a core part of the band … You’re always kind of half supporting him.”
The outpouring on social media, she says, has been enormous: “People are grieving the memories and the expectations [about One Direction reuniting one day] and how your relationship to the band is now forever changed.”
“I feel like every woman from her mid-20s to her mid-30s has some kind of relationship to [One Direction], or memories with them … That’s one of the really important things about fandom: at its best, it’s just a really caring community space.”
Australian fans outside the gates of a One Direction show in Melbourne in 2012. Credit: Getty Images
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