A Child’s Body: Open Access

Dear Hollywood

Alyson Stoner

Society & Culture

4.9 • 879 Ratings

🗓️ 18 August 2023

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Child stars face a strikingly bizarre reality where the world gains excessive, intimate and unchecked access to their physical body and personal life. From directors and crew members on set to fan encounters on the street to media coverage, child performers are not granted bodily autonomy and instead are placed in vulnerable situations that can have lifelong consequences. Alyson shares stories of being told to kiss people at an uncomfortably young age, TMZ tracking down their phone number and location, and legal contracts that dictated their appearance including the shade of their skin. As an independent podcast, your support means a lot. Subscribe and follow @alysonstoner to join the conversation. New episodes every Friday.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm so sorry that the AC's not working right now. That's all I can think of from like talking about
0:04.8	set conditions. I'm like, the AC's not working. I'm doing the thing, I've become the monster.
0:12.8	Okay, so getting into the three aspects of bodily autonomy, starting with body ownership.
0:28.0	I want to examine body ownership through the lens of access versus boundaries.
0:34.0	What do I mean by that?
0:35.4	I'm going to pick up from where my courageous friend's story left off when he talked
0:39.3	about being recognized and stopped daily and mention there is a striking and bizarre experience for young professionals in that so many people in their day-to-day encounters from adult crew members to fans on the street, have unquestioned, unchecked, intimate
0:58.9	access to the child's physical body, as well as their personal life and present emotional state.
1:05.0	I hope you find this as weird as I do.
1:07.0	At a cultural level, it's normalized to approach celebrities
1:11.0	to gossip about their relationships and wait, see posts about their personal lives,
1:16.9	treat them with a different set of social rules.
1:19.9	We really don't think twice about forming strong opinions of public figures, using words like,
1:26.2	I'm obsessed with them or they should just die, feeling like it's completely fine to comment on their life decisions as if we have any right or authority or awareness of their human experience.
1:39.0	We're invested in their journey and art and we feel offended or betrayed when they behave in ways
1:45.3	contrary to the reasons we followed them, whether that's a new haircut or some
1:50.9	dicey political stance.
1:52.8	Some of this speaks to the halo effect of fame on the public,
1:57.1	the way that we perceive one positive trait or impression of a public figure as their whole personality and character. If someone who has seen a show that I'm in perceives me as
2:10.0	talented or successful or kind or beautiful. They may also leap to assume I'm cool, nice, funny, smart, and upon
2:20.3	encountering me in real life, it could drum up really unexpected and even strange
2:26.1	responses. Even if you swear you're not the type to be starstruck, people become suddenly giddy. They want to be noticed and get the
	...

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