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Hey besties! Welcome to the Influence Issue. Meet our fall cover star, Victoria Paris.
Writer: Zoë Hecht Editor: Iman Hariri-Kia Designers: Jenna Freitas, Cailey Tervo, Megan Charles © Her Campus Media 2021
Knows exactly what she's doing.
Her Campus Fall 2021 Cover: The Influence Issue
YouTube users could upload a video, go to sleep, and wake up to a million views. A friend could share a photo of you on Instagram, and you’d be contacted by modeling scouts in seconds. Even early adopters of TikTok, like Charli D’Amelio, have said that they didn’t anticipate, nor understand, their rapid rise to celebrity. This myth was an evolution of the American Dream: One post could be enough to change your life forever. But in 2021, young people are poking holes in that lore. A report shows that 86% of Gen Z wants to grow up to become social media influencers. Video editing skills are becoming more useful than Excel. In order to become influential, young adults must harness the power of the one force missing from that original mythology: Intention. Instead of relying on chance, college students are driven by purpose, working hard in order to achieve influencer-status. And no one encapsulates this difference in thinking better than Victoria Paris, the only living girl in NYC. Victoria Paris knows exactly what she’s doing. In order to achieve TikTok virality, Victoria was strategic. She posted many times a day, studying the numbers, replicating her more successful videos and archiving the ones that flopped. To grow her other social media platforms, she used her TikTok to redirect viewers to YouTube and Instagram. And she managed to cultivate a “cult-like” audience by lifting the veil between Creator and Follower, bursting through the aforementioned mythology and sharing, well, everything. From grappling with her privilege to dealing with the mental burden of hate, Victoria puts it all out on the table, turning her life into a 24-hour reality show where she plays writer, director, and star. Her brand is her personality; her influence is her authenticity. Which begs the question: What does true influence look like? Is it a number of followers? The engagement in your comments section? Your net worth? A little blue check? Through talking to Victoria and reading about the work of our very own InfluenceHer Collective, I’ve come to the conclusion that influence is less about what you have and more about how you make people feel. Inspiring people to self-reflect. And that self-reflection can lead to real, actionable change. Readers, you influence me. And I hope our Fall Issue influences you, too. Love, Iman
IMAN HARIRI-KIA
Hey Besties, Welcome to Her Campus 2.0: A special little space on the internet, created for Gen Z, by Gen Z.
At the dawn of the internet, viral influence was marked by serendipity. A mythology was born around cyber fame that involved “accidental,” overnight success.
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Lily ParfittAge, 19
"I love bright colors and funky patterns. You’ll always see me in glittery eyeshadow and huge eyeliner. I want my work to reflect my spunky personality, so I try to create work with graphic liners, bold eyeshadows, with sparkles and pearls. I also draw a lot of inspiration from drag artists and creativity within the LGBTQ+ community. As a queer drag artist myself, I’m constantly inspired by my peers and their work."
what influences you?
Inside the issue
Makeup Artist
@lilyparfittartistry
Jaize Francis, 18
Stylist
@Ja1ze
"My biggest inspirations are @RicoNasty, @Melovemealot, and @Uglyworldwide. I greatly value self expression and creativity, and I always aim to tell a story through my personal style and makeup choices. I am influenced by the ability to stand out and start a conversation through embracing individualism."
Annalise D'Angelo, 20
Hair Stylist
@annalise.artistry
"People being freely themselves and not caring. The environment is a huge influence as well."
Nicole Pollack, 22
Photographer
@nicolepollackk
"I have always felt negatively about the idea of being influenced. I value being able to have my own thoughts and feelings more than anything. However, I realized lately that some influence can be positive. Being around people who are living authentically, not concerned about the way they are being perceived and going for what they want is always a huge source of inspiration and influence. This has come from seeing some of my friends take their first steps into industries they are very passionate about and worked hard to break into. As well as being around friends who are resilient when they don’t get the outcome they hoped for. A lot of positive influence to soak up lately."
Zoë Hecht, 21
Reporter
@zoe.hecht
"It’s hard to think of what doesn’t influence me in this current online age in which we receive massive influxes of information and opinions 24/7. With social media being such a prevalent part of our daily lives, we’re constantly being influenced — whether it’s by our peers, celebrities, influencers… the list goes on. A lot of times, I don’t even think we’re aware of being influenced since it’s become such a normal and integral part of our lives. On a more personal level, I think my family and close friends."
Jessica Penn, 23
Photo Assistant
@jessiepenn
"My friends are my biggest influence. The people I surround myself with are a carefully curated group of highly motivated individuals. We are constantly influencing each other to reach higher and think bigger. A win for one of us- is a win for all of us."
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The Only
Living
Girl in NYC
Victoria Paris may have girlboss-ed a bit too close to the sun.
The first time I see her, she’s chugging apple juice and wearing an oversized cream hoodie, her long dark hair pulled casually back to reveal her smiling face and warm eyes. “Hi!” she says. I smile back, my nerves about the pressure of interviewing “the only girl in NYC” dissipating. You probably know Victoria Paris, 22, from your FYP. Known for her digestible vlog-style videos, Victoria is simultaneously a TikTok “It Girl” and one of the most controversial influencers on the platform. Whether she’s passionately ranting to her iPhone camera, showing a PR unboxing from a luxury fashion brand, or running through a typical “day in the life” (which almost always features her breaking a sweat at the gym), Victoria is sharing everything. Her willingness to bare all is her gift. Authentic doesn’t even begin to cover it. Victoria is originally an east coast girl, spending her childhood in New Jersey (“I don’t claim the New Jersey side”) and later in North Carolina. She jokingly calls me her “west coast equivalent” after learning we share a strange number of similarities: both of our mothers are from Queens, New York, we both lived in New Jersey for the first 10 years of our lives, and we’re around the same age.
Victoria Paris
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Desiring a busier lifestyle beyond the predictability of suburbia, Victoria attended college in New York City, where she now lives as a full-time influencer and content creator. But if you’d told Victoria a year ago that this would be her career — that she would gain over a million followers in less than a year — she probably would have laughed at you. Becoming an internet sensation wasn’t a part of Victoria’s original plan — in fact, it was very much the opposite. Majoring in history and later launching into the finance world, the last thing on Victoria’s mind was becoming an influencer. She even scoffed at the idea after her family and friends repeatedly told her she would “perfectly fit the bill” with her outgoing personality and busy lifestyle. But everything changed at the peak of the pandemic, when Victoria lost her job at a finance startup. Needing to pay rent and loans, Victoria turned to TikTok as a way to promote her online Depop store. But Victoria soon learned that she could make money off of TikTok — and, more than that, she actually enjoyed making TikToks. This, she realized, could become something so much bigger. Victoria began posting 20 to 30 times a day, earning thousands of followers each time. Rather than an “overnight sensation,” she became an entrepreneur, choosing what to put on camera, developing her own brand. A woman in business. Victoria analyzed the algorithm, spending hours producing content and churning out video after video. She made note of which videos did well and which ones didn’t, adapting her strategy based on what her followers wanted to see. Her success is no accident. In only nine short months, Victoria has garnered over 1.2 million TikTok followers — aptly called “Victorians” — who follow her every move, support her through thick and thin, and even come together to spread positivity in the comments sections of other users or volunteer locally at food banks. A real, genuine community. She has also recently earned a little blue checkmark next to her username. Brand deals and partnerships constantly flood her email inbox, and her schedule is booked to the brim (she tells me this interview is her fourth or fifth meeting of the day). In September, she attended New York Fashion Week, sitting front row of the Staud Spring 2022 show alongside TikTokers Olivia Ponton and Tinx.
But Victoria always felt she was destined for something greater than small-town life.
Rather than an “overnight sensation,” she became an entrepreneur, choosing what to put on camera, developing her own brand.
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and while she assures me that she feels “so lucky and grateful,” the spotlight can be blinding and the pressure overwhelming. The swift rate at which Victoria grew is practically unheard of. She had 80K followers in January — by March, she had 500K. By May? A million. At the height of her skyrocketing rate of success, some TikTok users tried to copy her strategy — but it didn’t work for them. “I think authenticity is what made me so popular so fast, but also consistency,” she says. “Posting every day for almost eight months, nine months straight now was really what grew my audience. People felt like they could tune in at 1:00 a.m. or 1:00 p.m. and know that they would find content from me, which is what really grows this tight-knit community.” Victoria is never short on content. It takes me more time than I’d like to admit to scroll back through her thousands of videos to her first viral video that was posted back in December 2020. But as Victoria rapidly grew her following over the next few months, she began posting less. As she cultivated “an established brand,” she chose to “focus on raising quality, not quantity.” When I tell her that she still posts a lot, she laughs and says, “I do still sh*tpost.” Like any successful entrepreneur, Victoria’s business has evolved — so her strategy has, too. “I want to produce in episodic and season formatting,” she says. “Grey’s Anatomy fans don’t stop being fans of Grey’s Anatomy just because the new season’s not out. They rewatch the old season.” Despite — or perhaps, as a result of — her viral success, Victoria is no stranger to hate comments and cancel culture. The first time she was nearly cancelled by the internet was back in May, and it took a toll on Victoria’s mental health and wellbeing. “When I first met my boyfriend, people had tried to cancel me for the first time, and it was just so bad,” she says. Jordan Studdard, Victoria’s boyfriend, is no stranger to the public eye, amassing over 750K followers on TikTok. The two have been publicly dating for several months and sometimes post videos together. (Jordan is even in the other room editing a video during our interview.) “I was like, ‘Dude, can you take my phone?’ I couldn’t look at it. I couldn’t touch it for three days. I ended up running away, flying to Georgia because it was so bad. But you can’t escape it. I wake up and I read it. I go to bed and I read it.”
The speed of Victoria’s virality was meteoric,
Victoria
“This is my job now, and you can’t go into somebody’s work and heckle and harass them,” she says. “That’s illegal. You get thrown out of the business."
The day after our chat, a video pops up on my FYP in which a random user unsolicitedly calls Victoria “the meanest person on TikTok.” The comment section is difficult to read. I quickly swipe past the video. It was the first time I had truly encountered Victoria Paris Slander TikTok myself: a side of TikTok in which users critique and badger Victoria. Much of the hate she receives stems from her blocking users and deleting hate comments, as well as neglecting to adequately acknowledge her privilege, with users calling her “spoiled,” “pretentious,” and “entitled.” But Victoria refuses to let the hate hold her back from further developing her business model. “People on the internet can take something and run with it, out of context,” she says. This isn’t the first time Victoria has talked about accountability culture, and I soon learn that when Victoria is passionate about something, she can talk a mile a minute. While cancel culture is a modern cultural form of rejection that prohibits someone from continuing their career and has received a substantial amount of criticism in recent years due to its unwillingness for improvement, accountability culture aims to hold others accountable and encourage them to learn from their mistakes. “I’m honestly tired of accountability culture because, most of the time, people just want to find an issue with you,” Victoria says. “Obviously, I believe in
holding egregious offenders accountable, but there should be some due diligence behind people slandering other people. Who are you to hold me accountable? You’re an anonymous account, you know?” In an effort to silence her online bullies, Victoria has become infamous for deleting hate comments and blocking users who spread negativity on her videos, which has unintentionally fueled even more controversy for the budding internet sensation. At the time of our interview, #VictoriaParisBlockedMe has over 1.6 million views on the app. But Victoria stands by her decision to (literally) block out the haters. “This is my job now, and you can’t go into somebody’s work and heckle and harass them,” she says. “That’s illegal. You get thrown out of the business. In Australia they’re deanonymizing the internet so that people can’t hide behind these fake accounts. It’s hooked up to your passport, which I think is a really sick idea.” (Victoria mentions this idea several times throughout our thirty minute conversation.) In an attempt to address the growing problem of cyber abuse and bullying, the Australian government is currently considering requiring Australians to provide some form of identification, like a passport or driver’s license, to make social media accounts, as stated in the Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identity and Disrupt) Bill 2021. While this aspect of the bill would perhaps deter cyberbullies due to a lack of anonymity, some critics of the bill claim that bullies will bully no matter what, regardless of anonymity. Some have also said that the bill violates users’ privacy and may verge on censorship.
Coined by writer Kate Lindsay, the Victoria Paris Effect is a phenomenon that aims to encapsulate Victoria and an assortment of other TikTok celebrities catapulted into the public eye. The idea is essentially attached to the notion that whiteness, thinness, youth, and wealth are closely tied to gaining quick social media popularity. Think of Charli D’Amelio, Addison Rae, and all of your other favorite TikTok stars, and you’ll inevitably start to see the Victoria Paris Effect play out. The effect also attempts to explain why BIPOC creators are often left out of the limelight, highlighting systemic racism as an ongoing issue within the algorithm, consumers, and broader society. “I would say that more than 50% of people are famous because of how they look,” Victoria says. “I am white-passing. I’m half Puerto Rican and half Jewish. But I acknowledge that that serves me and has given me privilege in building my platform, whereas other people’s skin color and appearance can work against them. There needs to be a conversation about dismantling internalized racism. Why aren’t you engaging with a Black or Latina creator? You are furthering this issue.” Although actively acknowledging her privilege is a start, Victoria also stresses the necessity of continuously educating herself. “Just because I graduated college doesn’t mean I don’t want to ever learn again,” she says. Resolving the issue of systemic racism and the implications of the Victoria Paris Effect on TikTok does not lie in mere acknowledgment and self-education, but also in ceaselessly amplifying the voices of underrepresented BIPOC creators and making space for them on the platform. It must be a continuous and active endeavor by all white and privileged creators who inherently benefit from the Victoria Paris Effect. And TikTok needs to be held accountable, too — especially when formulating an algorithm that disproportionately and continuously penalizes certain creators.
Plus, Victoria recognizes that some of the criticism she receives regarding her rapid upsurge to stardom is precedented — especially when it comes to her privilege.
"There needs to be a conversation about dismantling internalized racism. Why aren’t you engaging with a Black or Latina creator? You are furthering this issue."
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I think back to the unsolicited amount of hate Victoria receives on a daily basis, and it strikes me how young she is. Despite her maturity, she is bound to inevitably make mistakes. And every mistake she makes, no matter how miniscule, is magnified on the internet. It occurs to me, and not for the first time, that although male TikTok personalities like Bryce Hall make mistakes all the time (and to a much larger and severe degree), they do not receive the same level of backlash or retaliation. Not even close. I think about how, as women, we are constantly picked apart over our smallest mistakes and shortcomings, constantly knocked down for any of our successes, and constantly being shrunken down by society. Successful women like Billie Eilish, Taylor Swift, and even Olivia Rodrigo have experienced exponential rises to the top — only to get knocked right back down. “As a woman, you’re constantly pushed to rebrand and be different, and to be sexual but not be too sexual, to be hot but not too hot, to be smart but not too intelligent — you can never win,” Victoria says. “You’re also in competition with other women constantly. People will constantly try to put you down, but you have to remember you can’t exit at the low, because there is always the rebound.” Throughout her short time in the spotlight thus far, Victoria has already been through her fair share of rebounds — and I don’t think she’s done yet. Because Victoria doesn’t want to let her haters win, and more than that, she isn’t going to stop being herself. She isn’t afraid to candidly talk about getting Botox to her fans or open up about her past struggles with addiction. She isn’t afraid to laugh loudly and be silly, but also raise awareness about more serious subjects like female financial literacy. And Victoria is only just getting started: On the horizon, she has plans to create a clothing line, grow her following on YouTube, and perhaps even start a podcast. She isn’t afraid to stand up to her haters. She is completely and fully herself. And in a world where the internet and the influencers that inhabit it are so scripted and fake and inauthentic, that is hard to come by. When you truly indulge in her content and get to know who she really is, she feels like a friend — not just another influencer on your FYP. I end our conversation by asking Victoria what influences her. Her initial response? “Bethany Frankel, from Real Housewives of New York City. She is a girlboss!” We laugh at the term “girlboss,” a trope that underwent a severe dismantling over the past three years for being sexist, toxic, and extremely whitewashed. “But I’m also influenced by the women who aren’t in the spotlight and who aren’t famous, because they’ve done so much footwork that you don’t hear about in Forbes articles, or on TV. Those women that are silent and have no public face or presence influence me.” Once a notion of female empowerment, the girlboss quickly morphed into the opposite, mutating into a harmful stereotype dominated by white and affluent women and fueled by patriarchal norms. In 2021, the word has even become a TikTok meme. But by flipping the script on what it means to be an influencer, to run a business, Victoria is essentially redefining the terminology. Perhaps the girlboss had to die, so it could be reborn in her image. “Victoria?” I say. “I’m not going to lie, you’re kind of a girlboss.” “Thank you.” She smiles sincerely. “That means a lot to me.”
“As a woman, you’re constantly pushed to rebrand and be different, and to be sexual but not be too sexual, to be hot but not too hot, to be smart but not too intelligent — you can never win.”
BACK TO BEGINNING
Because Victoria doesn’t want to let her haters win, and more than that, she isn’t going to stop being herself.
