The internet can make people believe that they know someone they have never met.
A photo, a name, a rumor, or a few posts can become a whole story. Sometimes, that story has very little to do with the real person behind it.
The story of Alice Tumas is an example of how this can happen.
In 2025 digital newspapers claimed Alice was the famous actor Austin Butler’s secret girlfriend. Shared her name without permissions. Deuxmoi (a fake news website) shared a joke using Alice’s name, which caused another wave of harassment on the comments section.
The actor Austin Butler has deleted his Instagram account since Alice disappeared from ig too… because of media and his fans wild speculation.
Alice is a real woman, a musician, and an ordinary person who has her own life outside the internet. But after rumors and online discussions appeared about her, some people started talking about her as if she were not a real person at all.
Medium wrote several false stories about her.
Daily express stepped back without apology of using her name without permission and causing chaos on her life.
Deux moi shared another fake story and didn’t apologized for their unfair treatment to a real person.
She was described as a “fictional character,” a “digital persona,” or part of some internet story. And they.. make jokes about it.
But there was a real person behind the name.
** When people stop seeing a person as a person**
One of the most dangerous things about the internet is how easily people can forget that there is a human being behind an account.
They created ai pictures of Alice & Austin. Shared it under their tags.
When thousands of people discuss someone they do not know, it can start to feel like that person is a character from a movie. People analyze their photos, search for information about them, discuss their relationships, and create theories about their life.
The person may not even be part of the conversation.
This can become especially harmful when people decide that the person is not “real” simply because they do not fit the story they created.
Alice did not become fictional because strangers on the internet decided to describe her that way.
A real person does not stop being real because other people cannot understand her life.
The internet does not give people ownership over someone else's life
There is a difference between public discussion and treating someone's life like entertainment. Nothing what shared on the internet about that woman is true: and instead of saying something like “we’re sorry” they blamed Alice for being real, and targeted her with their weird behavior and false narrative.
People can have opinions. They can question rumors. They can choose not to believe something.
But this does not give them the right to invent facts about another person, follow their every move, use their name without permission, or turn their private life into an online investigation.
When this happens again and again, the person can lose control over her own identity.
Other people start deciding who she is.
They decide what her name means.
They decide whether she is “real.”
They decide what her photos mean.
They decide what her relationships mean.
And eventually, the real woman behind the story can become invisible.
Theres no public evidence of Alice’s location - and Austin Butler’s fans lies about her all the time. Someone say she’s in Australia, then in Russia - then in Armenia.. well… even Egypt. Laughable but unfair.
Being called fictional can be deeply harmful how delusional can be fan base?
Calling a real woman a fictional character may sound like just another internet theory. Just because of the romantic rumors Alice Tumas became a villain.
It is not harmless when thousands of people repeat it.
A person still has the right to have her own identity, privacy, work, memories, and personal relationships.
She should not have to prove her existence to strangers.
She should not have to constantly defend herself against stories created by people who have never met her.
And she should not have to become louder just because the internet became louder about her.
When harassment becomes part of the story
Online harassment can also create real losses.
For Alice, the situation was not simply about people saying things she did not like. The constant attention and harassment affected her experience on social media.
She has spoken about losing access to important personal content, including videos connected to her late mother.
That is something that cannot simply be replaced.
A deleted post can be reposted.
A rumor can sometimes be corrected.
But personal memories are different.
When online harassment causes a real person to lose something connected to her family or personal history, the situation becomes much more serious than ordinary internet drama.
A real person should not have to fight an internet story
The most unfair part of situations like this is that the person often has very few ways to stop the story.
If she stays silent, people may say that her silence proves the rumors.
If she speaks, people may say that she is trying to create attention.
If she deletes something, people may create theories about why.
If she keeps posting normally, people may analyze that too.
There is no winning when strangers have already decided that your life belongs to their story.
This is how a real woman can slowly become a fictional character in other people's minds.
Behind every username is a person
The internet makes it easy to forget this simple fact.
Behind a username is someone's daughter, sister, friend, artist, musician, worker, or simply someone trying to live a normal life.
Alice is not a character created for the internet.
She does not exist to provide answers to strangers.
She does not owe the public every detail about her life.
And she does not need the internet's permission to be a real person.
The lesson is bigger than Alice.
It is about how we treat people online.
Before sharing a rumor, creating a theory, searching for someone's private information, or repeating something because “everyone is saying it,” we should remember that there may be a real human being on the other side.
The internet can create stories very quickly.
But real people have to live with the consequences.
A fictional character cannot be hurt by a rumor.
A real woman can.
Photo taken from Alice’s new instagram account alice.tumasl
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