Twenty-first-century pop idols embraced fandoms that nineties grunge artists had resented

Evidence

Unlike Pearl Jam’s ambivalence about their mainstream fans in the nineties, the idols mostly loved their cults. Lady Gaga embraced her Little Monsters with public declarations of solidarity: “To every little monster on the planet who feels different,” she posted to her Instagram. “So do I. And we have each other. Forever.” — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 540

Categorization

• XREF: Links to the death-of-the-sellout mechanism in the broader omnivore monoculture thesis, and connects the nineties grunge anti-commercialism contrast Marx is drawing.