Victims of Stage and Screen: Parasocial Savior Rhetoric and Coded Social Critique at the Convergence of Celebrity & Conspiracy Cultures

Author

Amy Whiteside, University of Arkansas, FayettevilleFollow

Date of Graduation

5-2025

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Communication (MA)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

Communication

Advisor/Mentor

Neville-Shepard, Ryan M.

Committee Member

Hatfield, Joe

Second Committee Member

Dehnert, Marco

Keywords

celebrity studies; conspiracy rhetoric; conspiracy theories; fandom; parasocial relationships; pop culture

Abstract

This thesis offers a critical rhetorical analysis of what I term parasocial savior conspiracy theories , a unique genre of conspiracy narrative that portrays a public figure as victimized and allows their fans to step into a savior role through their advancement of the conspiracy theory. These narratives, I argue, are both catalyzed by and further insulative to a fan’s parasocial relationship with the public figure in question. Herein, the celebrity acts as a vessel of projection for their fans’ anxieties about control, allowing them to displace their agency panic onto a beloved external party and critique factors that seem to limit their agency, all through a familiar pop culture buffer. As exemplars of this phenomenon, I offer two case studies of distinct parasocial savior conspiracy theories. The first chapter examines “Gaylor” conspiracy theorists as representing an agentic turn in Morris’s (2002) “fourth persona,” receiving private signals from Taylor Swift about her supposed queerness and constructing their advancement of the theory as a moral duty commensurate to the unique knowledge base bestowed upon them. The second chapter focuses on “KateGate” conspiracy theories surrounding Kate Middleton, wherein conspiracy theorists crusade to return her to the public eye as a way of restabilizing the traditional institutions of knowledge and familiar conceptions of white femininity upon which their worldview has come to rely. Ultimately, I argue that parasocial savior conspiracy theories are the product of an increased convergence of conspiracy culture and fandom culture, unique in their narrative construction that allows the individual to assume the role of savior. In turn, this serves to mitigate agency panic, enable what Miller (2002) calls “coded social critique,” and ultimately renegotiates expectations about the general public’s access to knowledge.