Poot Lovato

About

Poot Lovato is the nickname given to American singer and actress Demi Lovato based on an unflattering photograph of the celebrity that was uploaded to Tumblr in October 2015. Since emerging online, the photograph has spawned a series of photoshopped parodies and a myth centered around the entirely fictional twin alter ego of Demi Lovato.

Origin

On the red carpet before Demi's performance at the 2014 Royal Variety Performance at the Palladium Theater on November 13th, 2014, an unknown cell phone user took a snapshot of Demi Lovato.^[10] At some point, the photo was edited, possibly by the liquify and skew tools in Photoshop. As of November 3rd, 2015, both the original photographer and the original editor remain unknown.

A comparison of the original photo and the Poot edit.

On October 3rd, 2015, Tumblr user Versaceslut posted a sketch drawing of Demi Lovato based on the edited image of the pop star in the style of the "I Have Drawn You" fan art meme. In just a little over two weeks, the post garnered more than 75,000 notes.

":/photos/1032325

Spread

On October 11th, 2015, Tumblr Cstcrpt posted the image along with the caption that read: "Demi’s twin sister. She was locked in a basement her whole life. This picture was taken the first time she went outside. Her name is Poot." The post received over 87,000 notes before the user deleted the Tumblr account.

In the following days, the image instantly began spreading throughout Tumblr, with some users incorporating the photo into photoshopped images and otherwise adding to the story.^[2] On October 12th, Twitter user @OfficialPoot began tweeting in character of Lovato's alter ego; the user has gained more than 3,700 followers in the first week.^[3] On October 16th, Wattpad user KayleeMarieTodd began expanding the backstory of Poot in a fanfiction called "The Secret History of Poot Lovato." Incorporating some aspects of the Demi Lovato fandom, including the phrase "Delete It, Fat!", the backstory has received over 40,500 reads and 820 votes.^[4] In addition, others attempted to create a Wikipedia page for Poot Lovato, but it was removed and identified as a hoax.^[5]

Demi Lovato's Response

On October 23rd, Demi Lovato tweeted, then deleted, a response to the Poot meme. "Cool to see a shitty angle turn into a meme that circulates the Internet to people's amusement ha" she wrote, and then a second tweet said, "Oh and make actual "headlines"".

As of October 25th the tweets were deleted, according to Cosmopolitan Magazine.^[9]

Despite her own criticisms of the meme, Demi Lovato tweeted a gif of the picture on April 3rd, 2017 (shown below). The tweet received more than 36,000 retweets and 79,000 likes within the first 18 hours.

pic.twitter.com/Q5NcgJuQlN

— Demi Lovato (@ddlovato) April 3, 2017

Lovato's fans responded positively to the tweet, garnering it with enough praise to receive a Twitter moment.^[13]

Criticism

Many Tumblr users have complained that the Poot Lovato meme is problematic, marking it specifically as ableist, because the backstory seems to include aspects of Poot's personality that would make her differently abled, and anti-Feminist, because much of the humor comes as a critique of both Demi Lovato and Poot Lovato's looks.^[12] In addition, because of the appearance of Poot's altered skull structure, many have compared her to the microencephalic character Pepper of the show American Horror Story; this comparison has also been called ableist by disability activists.^[11]

Poot Beiber

In 2023, Hailey Beiber was photographed at a Tiffany & Co event in NYC with a hairstyle that led people to compare her with the Poot Lovato meme. On April 28th, 2023, TikToker @theinternetisajoke posted a clip of Hailey Beiber at the event and compared her to Poot, gathering over 7 million views in five days (seen below, left). Also on April 28th, TikToker @mehaesmemes posted a video of Hailey at the event with the title, "It's giving Poot," gathering over 700,000 plays and 80,000 likes in five days (seen below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References