Photo courtesy of Walt Disney Television, Flickr
Lia Marie Johnson, known for her bubbly personality on the Emmy-winning show “Kids React,” has been going on troubling live streams on Instagram. Her live streams will last up until eight hours at a time.
Johnson has been performing since she was a child, but was not in the spotlight until she started appearing on “Kids React” in 2010. She then went on to make appearances in other popular YouTubers’ videos. She even interviewed Barack Obama in 2016.
On May 8, 2019, she went live on Instagram for almost seven hours. At some point, she calls a friend and jokes that she has been on live stream for about seven hours. A viewer comments, "seven hours what?!" When she sees the comment, she looks disgusted and yells, "So apparently someone said I've been on here for seven hours, but I don't believe that.”
After hanging up with her friend, she becomes emotional, saying to the viewers how much her friend loves her. Her emotions change quickly, and she starts sticking her tongue out to the camera and yells, “Stupid humans! You don’t know the first thing about love until you really taste it.”
After the stream, fans were asking old friends of hers to help her. Alicia “urthgirl” Eris posted on her Instagram story after her inbox was flooded with messages.
“You don’t know their life personally,” she wrote. "Social media is very calculated, people show you what they want you to see. Please stop spreading the hate. The world needs more love. If you see someone struggling, why tear them down even more? I love Lia with all my heart, it's not my place to speak on her behalf."
Recently there have been more troubling livestreams that brought up more concerns.
In her live stream on Jan. 2 she seemed to be under the influence again. A man grabs her face and starts kissing her. There is a filter on the screen, obscuring his features. When he realizes she is on a live stream, he asks her to turn it off and says that if this gets out, it could be "bad for him."
Some believe it is her manager, Steven Wetherbee; it has not yet been confirmed to be him. Still, after the stream, he deleted all of his social media accounts.
A little after that live stream, Johnson posted she recently got out of a toxic relationship and is working on herself. Soon after that, she posted a picture with a new man, Ryan Bowers.
When she streamed with him on Jan. 30, fans were yet again concerned about her. She seems uncomfortable during the live stream and asks him to turn it off, but he refuses. Music is turned to full volume, and there is what seems to be yelling in the background. There has been speculation that he is using her for exposure.
Old friend Foreign Fie posted a video on January 6 titled, "Old Friend of Lia Marie Johnson (I'm Worried)." In it, she mentions that Lia opened up to her about her past.
“She had a lot of issues in her mind with things from her childhood and things that she's been through in her life," she said. “I know people have not been treating her right.”
The reasons behind this outburst are still unclear, and her last stream was on Feb. 1 with Bowers. Fans and influencers are still trying to get her help, but as of now, all they can do is watch her downfall through their phone screens.
dgohde@ramapo.edu
