Column | She is not the trader, but the product

It was only a few years ago that, like a modern-day Midas, everything she touched turned to gold. I still remember a video in which she stood in her living room clapping her hands with dopamine, while men carried in a brand new interior. From the bamboo hanging lamp, the ocher-colored armchair, to an Aqua Mundo-like amount of tobacco plants: every inch of her house was sponsored in exchange for some silly videos in which she flopped blissfully on her modular teddy couch, or gave a cup a thumbs up made tea with the brass Quooker.

That was once.

What she didn’t realize during her princess days is that she fell into a trap with the freebies and the high amounts of money she could charge for her recommendations. She never questioned the absurd extent to which she was feted by companies. Her pretty face and nice taste were simply rewarded by the world, she reasoned. A real job, or even further development of knowledge or talent, was not necessary. And anyone who gently warned about the impermanence or emptiness of such a decadent existence could easily be silenced by pointing out her annual income. She was self-sufficient, therefore feminist. She had seen it better than the plodders. She belonged to a new elite.

In reality, there is no real difference between her and the housewife who tried to sell plastic containers to her friends decades ago. Influencing often revolves around household products, and is also work that can easily be combined with home motherhood. In fact, influencing has gotten out of hand, hidden unemployment.

But even more seriously, corporate indulgence in exchange for advertising is downright Faustian. The influencer has sold himself. She is not the trader, but the product. And she pays for a life of luxury by giving up her intimate life, her morals and her independence.

The Midas in this contemporary horror fairy tale is now trapped. She has entered into so many ‘collaborations’ that she has priced herself out of the market. Where she used to have expensive bags and trips to Nice, now she has to sell incontinence pads and old-fashioned clothing brands with a grimace.

Stopping is not an option, because the mortgage and the nanny have to be paid. Just the thought of selling the house and all the designer clothes to start over in a rental apartment is too humiliating. Not after the lied enthusiasm about the Dyson, which in reality stops working after five minutes of moderate suction. Not after all those weekends away in which every moment of enjoyment was meticulously orchestrated and the romantic evenings were spent on laborious editing, swearing, and an angry husband who was snoring by the time she finally finished her work. And besides, where should she start? She has a gap in her CV dating back quite a few years, her self-image has been completely destroyed by social media and her child hides screaming when she sees her mother approaching her with a determined look and phone at the ready. Because the child does not want to turn into gold.

I imagine: the daughter of Midas in fifteen years, armed with knowledge and skills. She lives in an almost empty room, sleeps on a rice mat, has five pieces of clothing, reads books in the evenings. She doesn’t owe anyone anything.

The future is quite bright, perhaps.

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