What can Liam Payne's story tell us about child stardom?

One Direction band member Liam Payne died unexpectedly this week at the age of 31.

Fans around the world have gathered to grieve the musician who, along with his bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik, made songs that defined the 2010's like What Makes You Beautiful and Story of My Life.

Today on Commotion, culture critics Kathleen Newman-Bremang, Syrus Marcus Ware and Joan Summers join host Elamin Abdelmahmoud to reflect on the life of the One Direction star, and what it means for a generation to grieve a teen idol.

We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player.

Elamin: Joan, as you look at this story and all the different ideas of a man who appears to be in crisis — BBC reporting on these troubling allegations of the way that he treated his ex-girlfriend, there's maybe a cease-and-desist letter involved in that — where does that take you, in terms of hearing the way that this story has been covered and how we think about child stardom?

Joan: What I really grapple with [when] covering these stories, whether it's Liam Payne or Nickelodeon, Ariana, Demi, Justin, all of them — the fact that we can even have too many to list here? Thankfully, there are so many that make it out okay. But there are also many, many child stars that do not make it out okay. It is an industry with a body count. It is an industry with a legacy of pain. And every time a story like this happens, the first thought that I have is, when is it going to be enough? When is our culture going to seriously grapple with the fact that we consume a form of entertainment throughout our lives, whether as adults or as children with One Direction … and that industry that we participate in produces such unimaginable horrors in people's lives?

And it's not just in these child stars' lives. With so much trauma in everyday life, the pain that they go through ripples out into their communities. It ripples out into their families, their children and their other coworkers. They go on to maybe reenact systems of abuse that maybe they were put through as well. And it's interesting to me that the first thought is always like, "Oh God, look, there it is. Another one," right? The fact that we even have a pattern to point to troubles me. I really don't know what it takes to get people to really think something has to change about the way that children in this industry are treated. There have to be protections put in place much younger that are much firmer, that maybe means we don't get to enjoy the sort of stuff we get to enjoy right now.

Elamin: Kathleen, when you think about what Joan just said — the idea that this industry has a body count — does it feel that grim to you? The idea that we are participants in wanting young, very talented stars to be together and sort of achieve this level of fame, but there's a cost? It seems like there's a cost that we exact by demanding that over and over.

Kathleen: Yeah. I'm really sitting with what Joan just said. Reading about Liam, and this year we've had so many stories, like Nickelodeon and Demi Lovato's documentary, it does feel like we are complicit. And so when you watch that video and you see Nicole Scherzinger put that Polaroid up, you think, she is signing this life to him, that obviously did not end up as well as it could have. And what responsibility do we have as consumers in that? And so, yeah, I'm really sitting with it. I think it's about overhauling the industry and putting regulations in place, and putting the safety of children first and foremost. I think that's what we have to take away from all of this.

Elamin: I mean, they are children, and they really look like young children. It's really startling because it was so long ago. It was 2010. I guess you sometimes forget, especially when you see the levels of fame that they've all achieved, just like how truly children they were when you see those photos.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.

Panel produced by Jane van Koeverden.