Gen Z influencer sensation Alix Earle, 23, began her content-creation profession on TikTok in 2020 as a university freshman on the College of Miami. Right this moment, she has almost 4 million followers on Instagram and greater than 7 million followers on TikTok, lots of which she amassed in late 2022. What’s extra, she’s price an estimated $6 million, in accordance with a number of shops. Throughout school, she made $5 million in a single yr alone, in accordance with Forbes.
She’s beloved for her “get ready with me” movies, carefree perspective, and picture-perfect get together life-style, however social media customers have unveiled some unseemly posts from her previous that might bitter her stardom.
Beginning Thursday, Reddit customers revealed alleged screenshots of posts Earle had allegedly made in 2014, which repeatedly embody racial slurs. In screenshots of ASKfm posts, a person by the title of “Alixxxxxx” with a profile image that seems to be Earle responded to a number of posts utilizing the N-word. ASKfm is a social media platform based in 2010 that lets customers ask and reply questions “anonymously,” though many customers nonetheless remark utilizing their actual names and likenesses. On the time the unique publish was allegedly made, Earle would have been a younger teenager.
Reddit feed r/AlixearleSnark has been blowing up for the final day as customers try and validate the screenshots. One person uploaded a video displaying Earle commenting on totally different ASKfm posts made by individuals who she additionally adopted and interacted with on Instagram. The person was making an attempt to attract a connection between the customers by which Earle interacted with on each ASKfm and Instagram.
Earle has not made any public statements denying or affirming the accusations or authenticity of the posts. She and her crew additionally didn’t reply to Fortune for a number of requests for remark.
The Alix Earle impact
Earle is considerably of an anomaly. Whereas there are many Instagram and TikTok influencers on the market, there’s nobody else who fairly matches the extent of stardom and a focus Earle has obtained previously a number of years.
She’s landed quite a few model partnerships, from fashionable make-up manufacturers together with Tarte, Too Confronted, and Uncommon Magnificence, to drink manufacturers like Poppi. And he or she hasn’t simply earned these partnerships for her magnificence, however for her “humor, vulnerability, aspiration, relatability, and product mentions,” Janet Balis wrote in Harvard Enterprise Evaluate.
Earle can be part of the Unwell model, which incorporates podcasts from Earle (“Hot Mess”) and different Gen Z and millennial demigod Alex Cooper, host of “Call Her Daddy.” Plus, she’s famously courting Braxton Berrios, a large receiver for the Miami Dolphins. Her early posts with him referred to him merely as “NFL man.”
Followers need solutions
On the time of publication, Earle has not made any public statements in regards to the accusations or had responded to a number of requests for remark from Fortune. Followers have began calling on Earle to both fess up and apologize or show the allegations have been false or fabricated.
“Alix honey you need to address the elephant in the room,” one person commented on Earle’s most up-to-date Instagram publish.
“In today’s interconnected world, audiences demand accountability, and a single misstep can snowball into widespread backlash,” Toni Ferrara, founding father of Ferrara Media, a expertise administration and public-relations agency, advised Fortune. “When trust is broken, followers often disengage, reducing the influencer’s ability to impact and inspire their audience.”
The extent of affect Earle has is intently tied to her integrity, “and any perceived breach of that can be devastating,” stated Ferrara, who has greater than 18 years of expertise in public relations.
Different customers, nonetheless, say Earle’s alleged racist posts aren’t stunning, however disappointing. Earle’s publicity additionally occurred throughout the identical week Brooke Schofield, an influencer, podcaster, and actress, has equally come below hearth for previous racist posts, together with one the place she defended George Zimmerman’s killing of Trayvon Martin, a Black 17-year-old, whose 2012 dying largely sparked the Black Lives Matter motion.
Schofield, although, has issued three apologies for the posts she made as a youngster. However from Earle, it’s been crickets—a transfer public-relations and communications specialists say is a mistake.
“Alix Earle needs to own her mistakes and act fast: apologize sincerely, show personal growth, and make it clear she’s committed to learning from this,” Evan Nierman, founder and CEO of crisis-PR agency Crimson Banyan, advised Fortune. “Ignoring or downplaying the issue would only amplify the backlash and prolong the damage.”
Earle’s reckoning—together with Schofield—additionally underscores the significance of realizing and recognizing that one’s web footprint isn’t straightforward to erase or ignore.
“This situation underscores a harsh reality for influencers: Your digital past is never truly behind you,” stated Nierman, who has twenty years of expertise working in disaster communications. “In a world where accountability is non-negotiable, even long-past actions can resurface to create significant present-day consequences.”
