Chappell Roan Compares Herself To Britney In Her Tabloid Days

Chappell Roan is in her villain era — at least, that’s what the internet would have you think. During an appearance on TS Madison’s podcast Outlaws on May 19, the “Good Luck Babe!” singer opened up about her meteoric rise to fame and the pitfalls that came with it.

“I think that I've had like three [villain eras] in the past nine months probably just because I was the new girl in the pop game, where I was like, ‘I don’t give a f*ck what you say to these girls who have been doing this since they were 10 and have been told this is OK, how you’re treated,” the 27-year-old said.

Though she doesn’t specify, the “villain eras” may allude to her tense interactions with paparazzi on the red carpet, her refusal to endorse a candidate for the 2024 presidential election, and when she had to set boundaries with her fans on TikTok.

“I’ve been treated better at my doughnut-shop job than I have on a f*cking carpet,” she continued. “People on the news treat me worse than how customers did. And I think when I started to say, ‘Don’t talk to me like that, I’m not gonna show up for blah lalala, I don’t want to.’ That doesn’t mean that I’m a villain or ungrateful for what I have. It’s like, why is this customary?”

Roan went on to compare the backlash she’s received online to the tabloids’ treatment of Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan in the early 2000s. “There's so much love for, and apologies for people like Britney, or for people like Paris and Lindsay Lohan — people were so evil to them and how as a community, we need to apologize to Britney. I'm like, absolutely. But also that behavior ... they’re still doing it,” she said.

But Roan is standing her ground nevertheless. “Do you want me to just get to the point where I become agoraphobic? Or so stressed out or so anxious to perform? You want me to get to that point? Because if I don’t say anything I will. If I do not stand up for myself, I will quit because I cannot bear this. I cannot bear people touching me who I don’t know. I cannot bear people following me… Or I cannot bear people saying I’m something I’m not. That’s what’s really hard online.”