Have you asked other people to ruin someone's life lately? Hopefully not, but "Chandelier" singer Sia Furler just did. On Tuesday, Sia asked her Twitter followers to destroy a dry cleaner's reputation. Apparently, Metropolitan Garment Cleaning in New York's Queens area didn't do a great job washing Sia's clothes. She tweeted Tuesday, "Suggestions for revenge/pranks on dry cleaner who ruined favorite things and won't take responsibility? Please discuss." One of her followers gave her the bright idea to tweet the Yelp link for the place so they could, as Sia put it, "Write ridiculous terrible reviews."
It's unusual for a celebrity to use their Twitter followers to carry out their dirty business, but here we are. Usually when stars' fans act out, the celebs actually tell them to quit it — they don't encourage it. Unfortunately, a few of Sia's legion of 466,000 followers actually listened to her plea (though to her fans' credit, not many of them did) and descended on the Yelp page to express their anger.
Reviews like "I was murdered here" were swiftly deleted for not following Yelp's Content Guidelines, but a number of bad reviews mostly written by out-of-state people remain. For example, this review was the first posted on the page, and conveniently done so the day Sia asked people to review the place. Written by someone from Nebraska, it reads: "Went here. Absolutely awful. Rude, mean, expensive and Ruined my clothes. Don't recommend to anybody."
Fortunately, other people soon caught wind of what Sia was doing and flocked to the page to write nice reviews — now the place has four and a half stars. People have even written reviews making fun of Sia, saying things like:
When I was on a business trip to NY I swung by here and dropped off two suits that had been nesting in the bottom of my carry-on. Job well done, and quickly. I did not ask for extra sia, maybe that's the problem. When I find out what this mystery additive is I'll avoid it, as it apparently ruins things for no reason.
Since her request to tarnish the name of the business, Sia has tweeted again:
But she made no apology for potentially trying to ruin someone's business. Perhaps Sia just had a bad experience at the dry cleaner's and the place is usually great. Maybe they really are awful. Either way, no business deserves to be destroyed by a celebrity with a flock of willing-to-do-anything fans.
Next time, we hope Sia listens instead to what the Better Business Bureau recommended. It's a much classier way to handle your issue.
