What’s it like to be one of the biggest mouths on South Africa’s social media scene? Joonji Mdyogolo tracked them and got an earful, and an eyeful.
Theodora Lee
Web star
About 125 000 YouTube subscribers
I’ve been in Theodora Lee’s bedroom. I know when she had her first period (on holiday in Spain). In a YouTube post about sexual assault, she admits to having been with a boy who used her “naïve infatuation to get me to do things I did not necessarily want to do”.
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Too much information? Not if you’re a young girl wanting to talk about things you can’t discuss with your parents.
And young women are exactly who are blowing up Lee’s page views: about 32 000 for “Dealing with periods”, close to 50 000 for “Sex and sexuality” and more than 140 000 for one of her most recent posts, “Losing your virginity”.
Capetonian Lee (23) started posting comic, upbeat videos in 2013.
“This year I felt I wanted to be different. I started becoming a sisterly figure and saw it was kind of working, so I rolled with it,” she says, revealing her business savvy.
She has not reinvented her personality; she’s just showing a certain element of it. “Everyone on social media puts their best foot forward. What’s out there is the bubbly side, with all the energy – the person who’s great at making life choices.”
But the internet can be a dangerous place for young women, even for those bearing good advice and who sing “Hello, lovelies” to greet followers. Lee does get negative comments, but nothing threatening, she says.
“The hardest part is being compared to my brother.” Caspar Lee is South Africa’s biggest YouTube star, with almost 3.5?million subscribers. “Just being called Caspar’s sister … I suppose that’s what I need to work on.”
See article by Joonji Mdyogolo in M&G that includes the following media stars:
Nonhle Thema
Television host and actress
About 219 000 Twitter followers
Fikile Mbalula
Minister of sport and recreation
About 114 000 Twitter followers
Gareth Pon
Filmmaker, photographer and Instagramer
About 217 000 Instagram followers
I See a Different You
A trio of photographers/creatives
About 16 000 Instagram followers
Khaya Dlanga
Marketer
175 000 Twitter followers
Shaka Sisulu
Social activist
About 60 000 followers
Thick Leeyonce
Photographer
About 21 000 Instagram followers
Nomboniso Gasa
Researcher, writer and analyst
About 16 000 followers on Twitter
Justin Gabriel
Professional wrestler
About 998 000 likes on Facebook
