INQUISITR.COM / Entertainment

Manipulation Of One Direction Echoes Allegations Made By X-Factor Winner

By Alan Ewart
Published on: 22:29 PST, Feb 7, 2016

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One Direction fans have long suspected that the band’s image is manipulated by their management team and that PR stunts are a way of life for Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. As everyone must know, One Direction were formed during the bootcamp stage of the 2010 season of X-Factor. The boys had entered the show as solo artists, but were brought together to form One Direction because Simon Cowell had spotted a gap in the boy-band market and because X-Factor’s record with bands was dismal.

One Direction went on to become one of the biggest bands in the world and by some distance were the most successful act the show had ever produced. The members of One Direction were selected for their looks and personality as much as for their talent as singers.

Cowell recognized the necessity to present the public with a “package” that they could buy into and One Direction were as close to the complete package as we are ever likely to see. People in their millions bought into One Direction and they were built into a $1 billion brand.

Of course, not everyone bought into the One Direction phenomena. The “serious” music critics and music fans wrote of One Direction as a manufactured band singing manufactured songs largely written by other people. As One Direction has matured, they have taken more control over their music and their creative output. It may prove to be the case that taking control of their image under their current management may be a step too far for One Direction.

One Direction fans across the world were delighted last week when the Sun revealed that Harry Styles had officially ditched the One Direction management team as he looks to forge a solo career. One Direction fans abhor the fact that Styles has been sexualized since he was just 16-years-old. No sooner was the X-factor season complete than Styles was being linked with Caroline Flack by the Daily Mail.

For the past five years the media has maintained an unhealthy fascination with One Direction members sex lives. There is an old saying in the press “sex sells,” and it would appear that this is something that Cowell and One Direction’s management have bought into from the very start of X-Factor. Steve Brookstein, the winner of the first season of X-Factor reveals in his book, After The X how stories about him were leaked to the press and how he, a 35-year-old man was sexualized in a way that he found very uncomfortable.

In a series of claims that bear an uncanny similarity to One Direction’s portrayal in the media, Brookstein revealed that he was portrayed as a sex symbol and as “the housewives favorite.”

“Heat magazine had me down as a sex symbol –this agenda was starting to be the norm. The more I read it the more I felt it positioned me as seedy.”

One Direction fans will doubtless recognize some of the stunts that were reported about him. Brookstein revealed that he had bumped into Soap Opera star Tina Hobley in a bar and they had a chat. Tina kissed him on the cheek as she left and as a result the Sun ran an article claiming the pair were hooking up.

Brookstein also revealed that on the day of the X-Factor final newspapers in Scotland were set to run totally false stories about him.

“I was unaware that, on the day of the final, newspapers in Scotland were running front-page stories that if I were to win I would propose to Eileen. Eileen also pointed out that some papers had suggested we were splitting up. Both lines were nonsense.”

It seems that all these years later One Direction are still being subjected to the same trashy stories. Just today Unreality TV claims, without a shred of evidence that One Direction star Louis Tomlinson has gotten engaged to “girlfriend” Danielle Campbell. Sadly this cycle is all too familiar to One Direction fans. Just last week it was reported in Inquisitr that we would see stories claiming that Louis was in love just before we see the break-up stories.

In another uncanny parallel with One Direction, Brookstein was subjected to numerous stories leaked to the press by “unnamed sources.” He was certain that his management team were feeding often untrue stories to the press just to keep his name in the papers. This is something that One Direction fans are all too familiar with.

Brookstein had been told by Cowell that Max Clifford would “manage” anything that needed to be sorted with the press. He claims that this meant that unfavorable stories would be suppressed but that his name would be kept in the press.

One Direction fans have long wondered why so many unfavorable stories about One Direction are published. After all, Cowell’s head of PR is Anne-Marie Samson who was Max Clifford’s protege and is married to the U.S. Editor of the Sun. One Direction’s management team have numerous links into the media outlets that write so many stories about One Direction.

If Brookstein is to believed, the stories about One Direction are printed because that is exactly what One Direction’s management team wanted printed. Many One Direction fans will be dismayed though not surprised to find out the depth to which One Direction are manipulated by their management.

[Photo by: KGC-161/STAR MAX/IPx/AP]

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