i get where you're coming from, but i don't know if we're talking about the same thing. an example of someone who comes across authentic is her best friend karla (karla's closet and i think her ig is karla_deras if i remember correctly). she's a pretty good example. karla has a great aesthetic, great eye and seems authentic in the sense that her life seems to be curated naturally. even back in the days of fashion blogs, karla always stood out from the pack bc of that. alexis belon is another example. as well chrissstttiiine. i don't follow gurus closely and don't consider rachel to be one, so i couldn't name very many. if weylie and maybe stephanie villa are considered gurus then i guess them to a certain extent. and claire marshall for the first couple or so years of her channel.Derpina123 wrote: ↑Sat Feb 20, 2021 1:32 pmI agree. But how do you portray yourself as "authentic" or "genuine" anyway? Because crafting a persona/character to promote a certain worldview/lifestyle is part of the job. It's as "ingenuine" as setting up a subject and painting it. Even if you were being completely "raw", "authentic", "genuine" – whatever these things mean – you would have to carefully record and curate everything to make a good YouTube video. And people would still find something to complain about it. What "gurus" would you consider "authentic" and "genuine"?freshtodef wrote: ↑Fri Feb 19, 2021 7:22 pmwatched her "loft tour" she posted today. came up on my feed and i checked it out bc i hadn't watched anything of hers since the video she made about moving out/the breakup almost a year ago. while watching it, all i could think was that it must be absolutely exhausting to be her... to have to turn every. little. thing. into an aesthetic or "vibe." i can't even take her spiritual woo-woo, eco-friendly, "thrifting and reusing your old takeout containers is healthy for the environment and saves money" stuff seriously bc it all feels ingenuine and just an extension of her "aesthetic" and crafted persona.
i sometimes wonder if she has long breaks between uploads on youtube and instagram bc it's tiring for her to keep up the perfectly imperfect cool girl facade.
rachel has just always, always, always come across as a self-important tryhard... like the art school kid who always has to keep topping themselves bc they thrive on being told how amazing and creative they are (can you tell how many people like this i went to school with? lol), even 12-13 years ago when i first discovered her via her blog, so it's nothing new. i don't expect her vlogs to be 100% raw and unedited, nobody's is. but when she says things like... "i like sound baths, thrifting, going to farmers markets, spiritual healing in joshua tree, etc bc of the vibe/aesthetic" it just makes me laugh. nothing is wrong or "inauthentic" about actually liking any of those things, but like some of us said a few pages back, she comes across as the type of person who literally spends all their free time trying to scour the internet for the "coolest", most subversive and obscure references (and mishmashes them with whatever the latest la hipster fads are) in order to feed her fake vibe and aesthetic. i think that is the main difference between her and the people i mention above... natural growth and curation.