Maybe I’m Afraid of You: Parasocial Relationships in “Bite The Hand”

Boundaries are inherent in celebrity-fan culture, for better and for worse.

In 2018, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus joined forces to release an EP as supergroup boygenius. After a hiatus to focus on solo work, they released the record in 2023 and toured sold-out venues throughout the summer.¹ The topic of celebrity-fan culture has come up recently with Chappell Roan’s comments on social media about setting boundaries. The reality is that the larger a fanbase becomes, the bigger its distance from the performer has to be. Nevertheless, the increased perceived accessibility of celebrities and influencers on social media creates the perfect environment for the forming of parasocial relationships, which can then affect real-life experiences in settings such as live music events. “Bite The Hand,” from the boygenius EP, explores the band’s complex relationship with and attitude toward their fans.² The way they frame it, giving insight into their perspective as performers, this dynamic is simultaneously mutually beneficial and mutually destructive.

Out of Reach

The first verse provides a literal description of how a performer onstage perceives the audience in front of them: “I can’t hear you, you’re too far away / I can’t see you, the light is in my face.” While putting on a concert, the speaker cannot hear individual voices or see people in the crowd because the environment is not conducive to reciprocal relationships. Rather, the closest audience members are looking up at (and to) the speaker onstage, effectively illustrating this social imbalance. Ironically, the stage lights stop the speaker from seeing the crowd while making it possible for them to see her in the first place. These lyrics also apply figuratively to the speaker’s experiences with fans. The fans are “too far away,” both physically and socially—now that her fame has grown beyond her reach, she “can’t hear” a lot of the discourse surrounding her life and career. Similarly, the “light” also refers to being in the limelight, an experience that keeps the speaker from seeing or forming new relationships with people outside of it.

In the subsequent lyric, the speaker admits that she is okay with these barriers: “I can’t touch you, I wouldn’t if I could.” The fans are literally and figuratively out of the speaker’s reach, but even if they weren’t, she would maintain her distance; she is not interested in forming closer relationships with them. There is also an element of fear in this line—not wanting to “touch” someone out of unease or discomfort—that is reiterated in the bridge.

The refrain, which is repeated throughout the song, is a single line sung three times: “I can’t love you how you want me to.” This succinct thesis statement is a simple but apt commentary on the unrequited aspect of fan-celebrity relationships. Artist worship and the desire to personally get to know a celebrity is quite prevalent in fan culture. The “love” that some fans want from performers they look up to is platonic or even romantic, but it’s a feeling shared by the masses. Celebrities can, and often do, say that they love their fans, expressing a gratitude for and enjoyment of their attention and occasional interactions, but this will never be enough for the people that the speaker is addressing here. They feel seen by her art and thus crave that same attention from her, but it’s simply unfeasible—and often inappropriate—for the speaker to reciprocate this “love” for all those people. The existing dynamic makes it impossible for an ordinary relationship to develop between her and a fan.

Highlight Reel

In the second verse, the speaker identifies further issues with the situation: “Here’s the best part, distilled for you / But you want what I can’t give to you.” As consumers of media, people enjoy believing that they are seeing authentic representations of their favorite celebrities onstage or online, but the speaker states here that she is only highlighting the “best part.” Much like non-famous people regard certain social media platforms as vehicles to flaunt their positive experiences, those with large followings provide the public with very curated presentations of their lives or public personas, safeguarding their privacy to various extents. The speaker notes that this is “distilled for you,” that she is doing her fans a favor by only showing them what they can easily digest so that they can continue to happily idolize her. Nevertheless, they always “want” more, be it content, information, appearances, or art. This all comes down to the speaker’s time and her need to maintain boundaries regarding her personal life and private information, even if she sometimes wants to satisfy their “want.”

She follows this with a complexified image of reaching out to someone: “Your hands are gravity while my hands are tied.” With this metaphor, the fans and their desperation become “gravity” itself, an irresistible force pulling the speaker towards them. The implication here is that, if it weren’t for an external obstacle keeping them apart—whatever is tying her down—she would surrender to this force. Her “hands are tied” for the sake of the metaphor, but also as an indication, through the idiom, that she has no control over these circumstances. In fact, perhaps the only control she can exert regarding this topic is the expression of her feelings about it in this very song.

Strangers

The bridge begins with a series of rhetorical questions, as the speaker’s rising confrontational energy is reflected in the music: “Who do you think you are? / Who do you think I am? / What do you wanna say? / What do you think will change?” These questions, and the increased pace of the lyrics, reflect her exhaustion and frustration with those who try to cross boundaries. The first one asks the listener where they find the audacity to make unreasonable demands or requests, but also brings up the issue of how they perceive their relationship to the speaker, who doesn’t know them. The second question similarly contains the dual connotations of incredulous sarcasm and genuine confrontation of the issues at hand, including an acknowledgement of the strangeness of fame. The way that the fans “think” of the speaker is not a reflection of who she really is, since they’ve only been exposed to what she deliberately presents in her art. When fans meet their idols, there can be a lot of pressure surrounding what they would “wanna say” to them and what lasting memory they can get out of a short interaction. In the last two questions, the speaker pushes back on this notion, wondering what someone might plan to say that they “think will change” the fan-artist relationship somehow—it will almost always be more memorable for the fan due to the inherent barrier of this dynamic.

A Paradoxical Relationship

Finally, the speaker addresses the fear behind her ambivalence towards these relationships: “Maybe I’m afraid of you.” Taken literally, this voices the legitimate fear surrounding fan interactions where danger and security are concerns. Still, even if the speaker is physically safe, she might be “afraid” of the intensity of fans’ expectations of her and of what forming closer relationships with them would entail. This is where boygenius incorporates the song title: “I’ll bite the hand that feeds me / Bite the hand / I’ll bite the hand that needs me / Bite the hand.” The phrase means to act badly towards someone who has helped you, and is often used as a negative command: “Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.” The speaker’s very inclusion of this idiom is an acknowledgement that her attitude of discomfort and apprehension towards fans might be considered ungrateful or might actually be something bad or self-destructive. Nevertheless, throughout the song, she emphasizes that this withdrawal is not a choice and that there are barriers that make it impossible for her to sustain her work while also putting forth all of herself for public consumption.

The structure of these lyrics, and the change from “feeds” to “needs,” indicates that the fan-artist relationship is reciprocal, albeit unequal; the fans consume and purchase the art so that the artist can keep creating it and earning income (“feeds”) but, in return, they must provide fans with the content they want (“needs”). In “bit[ing] the hand,” the speaker is hurting a group of people who have not only helped her, but who also rely on her emotionally in some way. The repetition of just “bite the hand,” where “bite” becomes a command for the listener, furthers the understanding of this reciprocal relationship. Fans and artists are in a constant state of simultaneously helping and hurting each other; “feed” and “need” are opposites but exist within the same actions when viewed from both perspectives. Here, the speaker observes that the fans are doing the biting as well, since she “feeds” them her art and “needs” their support. The complexity with which boygenius treats this one seemingly simple phrase is an impressive reflection of the depth of a song with so few lyrics.

You’re on Camera!

In the final iteration of the refrain, the three members of the band sing the line with staggered entrances, each a third higher than the last, repeated over and over again. This beautiful section builds musically and then stops abruptly, with the production stripped bare as the lyric is sung two final times in a cappella three-part harmony. This ending serves as a reminder of the band’s abilities at their core, when everything else is taken out of the equation. When boygenius performs this song live, the screens behind the stage have cameras panning across the audience instead of showcasing the performers. Throughout the rest of the concert, these screens function as a method for the crowd to better see the band—even at a live show, the camera is another necessary barrier between artist and spectator. By putting the audience up on the screen during “Bite The Hand,” the band illustrates their inaccessibility while literally spotlighting the subject of the song. Crucially, the fans see themselves up onstage reflected back at them, but the band is still facing away from the projection.

Although this song was released six years ago, it contributes to the timely discussion of celebrity-fan culture with its unique commentary on the complexity of these relationships. The speaker observes that fame comes with the double-edged sword of attention that will never be mirrored, and that’s just the way it is. For boygenius, the expression of these feelings comes through in this song and their performance of it. Ironically, in writing a song about this issue, the band is still entertaining and feeding their fans, but keeping it decidedly on their own terms. The perspective offered in this song serves as an important reminder that, regardless of fame or achievements, most celebrities want to be treated respectfully, as people, and that’s the most that you should expect from them in return.³

1. They also won three Grammys!

2. Dacus sings all the solo lines in this song but all three are credited as writers, so in my analysis I'll be referring primarily to "the speaker" as well as to the band as a whole.

3. For further reading on this topic, check out Heartstopper author Alice Oseman's novel about parasocial relationships, I Was Born for This.