Essay

There Is a Cost to Becoming an Image

On Britney Spears, social media, and the temptation to trade personhood for visibility

Chelsea M. Thacker · June 23, 2026Identity · Image · Performance · Culture · Visibility

On Britney Spears, social media, and the temptation to trade personhood for visibility

This earlier essay is still published on Medium. This page holds its place in Living Terrain, where it connects to the rest of the work.

Where this sits

Charted in the Atlas as evidence in Why does technology change us? — at Technology.

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