South African Celebrities Are Taking Their Lives Over Twitter
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South Africa’s mental health crisis is now acute. A comprehensive scientific study in 2021 revealed that 33% of South Africans were depressed, with 45% feeling fearful, and 29% facing loneliness. Anxiety from world-record violent crime, joblessness, and a pressure to secure one’s future in a failing country has not only tipped South Africa’s ordinary citizens on the edge but local celebrities too.
Fatal anxiety in South Africa’s celebrities’ circles came to the forefront in late January with South African actor Patrick Shai, star of the film adaptation of Cry the Beloved Country, suddenly recording a bizarre Twitter video challenging South Africa´s most famous hip-hop star, Caster Nyovest, to a round of boxing duels. A torrent of comments and memes followed.
In the morning, Mr. Shai committed suicide. Shai had dared to fight Nyovest, a wildly successful hip-hop star colloquially called “South Africa’s Drake.” Nyovest, who has 4 million Twitter fans, is 31 while the late Shai was 65.
In mid-February, Ricky Rick, 34, one of the most successful South African rappers of his generation, recorded a weird-looking Valentine’s Day Twitter video lavishing praise on his spouse. Waves of comments followed it and weeks later, on March 2, Ricky Rick left millions of his fans grieving after abruptly ending his life.
“It’s the classic collision of Twitter, toxic online fame and mental health breakdown that’s tearing apart South Africa’s celebrities,” Winnet Xulu, a psychologist in Johannesburg, South Africa’s commercial capital and where the country’s most famous celebrities live, told Paste.
Online bullying, excessive adulation, and sudden digital fame are driving South Africa’s celebrities to the brink. “They feel not a day must go without revealing an intimate aspect of their private lives or thoughts to millions of their Twitter fans,” said Xulu who, in her private practice, counsels quite a handful millennial hip-hop stars in South Africa.