I Accidentally Started A Clairo Death Hoax: An Interview With Extra_Stinky

On September 25th, Instagram user extra_stinky posted what should have been an innocent continuation of an inside joke between her and the 15,000-plus followers on her private meme page. The first post was an image of a two-year-old photoshopped news headline claiming bedroom pop singer Clairo had died. The second was a simple image of the musician, adorned with the word "RIP" on the top, and "CLAIRO" on the bottom. I spoke to extra_stinky to get some more context on the whole death hoax.

"The joke surrounding Clairo originally started a few months ago when I posted a selfie of Clairo with no context. A couple of people in the comments actually assumed that the girl in the selfie was me, which started a kind of inside joke with my followers that I was Clairo. I decided to bring the joke back a couple of weeks ago by uploading an 'admin reveal' post with the same Clairo selfie I had posted a few months ago as kind of an inside joke for those who remembered the joke from back in June. I also thought it would be funny to convince people who might not know who Clairo is that I somehow was her. From there I made a couple more jokes telling people to check out my music, directing them to Clairo’s songs on Spotify. The joke eventually turned into a 'RIP Clairo' meme when one of my followers sent me a screenshot of a fake news headline from two years ago saying that Clairo had died, as well as a picture of Clairo with the caption 'RIP CLAIRO.'"

The posts performed modestly, receiving thousands of likes but nothing that constitutes "viral." It looked as though the joke had gone over well — nothing worth dwelling on. Unfortunately, not all of her followers were as keen to leave the Clairo stuff as an inside joke.

"I posted both images assuming people would refer back to the running joke that I was Clairo, but unfortunately the meme took off in a different way than I expected."

In a mere few days, extra_stinky's fans started sharing these memes across social media platforms. Some reposted the memes from her page, others simply tweeted and posted out their condolences, the messages often dripping in self-aware irony. To some, they were an obvious joke — to others, not so much. Some people got legitimately angry about the memes, and others fell for it completely, thinking Clairo actually died for a minute. It didn't help that one user actually went to Wikipedia and edited it to say Clairo had died by falling down the stairs, a commonly used cause of death associated with these memes. What started as an inside joke was quickly snowballing into a full-on death hoax.

"Initially I thought it was pretty funny that people were playing along and saying that I/Clairo had died. But obviously, not everyone knew the context of the joke, so some people became worried that Clairo herself had actually passed away which wasn’t necessarily my intention. It definitely started feeling out of my control when people started commenting 'rest in peace' on her posts and when someone even changed her Wikipedia page to say that she had died."

Then, on September 27th, the whole thing came to a strange head: Clairo found out about the death memes. Twitter user irene commented on one of Clairo's posts, filling her in on the hoax, to which Clairo responded a simple, "what."

"I was pretty shocked that she had become aware of the memes. My goal wasn’t to start an actual death hoax and I obviously never intended for the meme to go that far or for it to involve her directly. I honestly felt kind of bad and am hoping she wasn’t offended by the jokes, as I had no bad intentions. I actually enjoy her music and think she’s a really sweet girl. I have absolutely nothing against her."

The hoax didn't end there, though. Users continued to tweet about Clairo being dead, continued to make memes about it, and many Clairo fans continued to denounce it. Clairo's "death hoax" didn't necessarily reach the heights of some other celebrity death hoaxes. The mainstream media didn't report on it, and it never went trending on social media, but the hoax didn't go unnoticed by any means. I asked extra_stinky if she regretted making the memes, and she told me:

"I don’t necessarily regret making the jokes as I intended them to be received, however, I do wish I had provided more context or explanation for the memes so that not so many people took the joke seriously. Unfortunately due to my lack of explanation, many people did actually believe that Clairo had died or thought that I had malicious intentions with making these jokes. My goal was never to upset Clairo or her fans or to start a legitimate death hoax. I’d say having someone change Clairo’s Wikipedia to say that she had died was definitely further than I intended for the joke to go."

Clairo's Wikipedia has since been changed back, and the posts about Clairo dying are starting to wind down. This whole incident now stands as a show of just how far a simple set of memes can go. It shows us how something as innocent as an inside joke on a private meme page can blow up into an internet-wide mini-phenomenon — a runaway train that not even the original poster can control. With something like a death hoax, it's every individual who continues to rip away the original context and reshare the false sentiment as true that's at fault, but assigning blame to any one individual is useless. No matter what you think of it, death hoaxes are just a natural part of the internet, and extra_stinky realizes that, too.

"I think [people's love of death hoaxes] probably has to do with shock value and seeing how others react to some of the most shocking and grave news you can hear about a celebrity." I then asked extra_stinky if she had any message to put out to those who continue to support the memes, and she said, "I would just ask that people don’t directly involve Clairo herself by tagging her or commenting it on her posts, incase this is upsetting to her. I’d also ask that you don't do anything that would actually turn the joke into a legitimate death hoax."

Now, the "Clairo's dead" memes have reverted back to their natural state, as an inside joke on extra_stinky's page that she continues to share from time-to-time, and that's perfectly fine. If you ever read this, Clairo, know this: There were never any bad intentions here, just a joke taken a little too far. Welcome to the internet, right?

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