This social media 'influencer' offers mental health therapy for Rs 1,500, gets trolled

A well-intentioned but grossly irresponsible 'offer' by a social media influencer led to immense backlash and criticism on the internet over the past few days.

Indian fashion blogger and social media influencer Santoshi Shetty, who runs the fashion blog ‘The Style Edge’ posted a video on Instagram offering mental health therapy.

Shetty had offered to be a good listener to unhappy people for a nominal charge of Rs 1,500. She has no degree in psychology or mental health therapy.

The blogger had announced the Flying Cheese initiative on Instagram recently, whereby she made to offer one-on-one therapy for Rs 1,500. She claimed she wanted to start talking about the importance of understanding mental health and provide “therapy” to those struggling with mental health conditions such as anxiety, depression, etc.

In the Instagram video, that has now been deleted, she offered “positive vibes”. However, evidently, the generous offer was not taken well by netizens and mental health professionals, who spared no time to call out the insensitive move.

Bloggers have hit a slump so one of them SantoshiShetty has decided to become a mental therapist with ZERO I repeat ZERO expertise in this field. What's worse is she is charging 1500/session & defends it as a beautiful gift and gibberish! Mental health reduced to a bloggers fad! pic.twitter.com/6TCU2sOBh9

— Maya (@Sharanyashettyy) July 7, 2020

#santoshishetty preaching about creating good & safe community 4 ever1 by charging 1500 per “therapy session” without having any degree or license in d field of psychology is like me asking my friends to get their root canal treatments done by me for 5000. I’m an Arts student.

— A (@Anushkathehomie) July 8, 2020

Wait so #santoshishetty, a FASHION BLOGGER who studied architecture, really started a whole venture where she is the ThErAPiSt and charges ₹1500 per session.

Guess, she really believed in "you can be what you want to be".

I'm- pic.twitter.com/aHkZJJXwep

— Rajvi Desai (@RajviDesai31) July 7, 2020

Why am I writing critical analysis day in and night , spending hours understanding the dsm , icd , differences between symptoms and residual symptoms when #SantoshiShetty just became a therapist because she has good energy , and made a IGTV about it.

— badgirlsupreme (@_badgirlsupreme) July 6, 2020

An influencer wants to offer one-on-one sessions (PAID). What the hell is wrong with people? Do people realize that therapy is a science? Would you trust an influencer to be your doctor? It is because of shit like this that healers, charlatans are popping up everywhere to confuse

— Omar Bazza (@bazzapower) July 8, 2020

The video has now been taken down by fashion blogger Santoshi Shetty and she has also issued an apology “for not clarifying that it was never meant as a substitute for mental health therapy sessions”. She also said that she only wanted to “create a community” where people could “grow together spiritually”.

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A post shared by Santoshi Shetty (@santoshishetty) on Jul 7, 2020 at 5:32am PDT