Anybody who grew up getting bullied for how they looked has imagined a moment like this.
You’ve probably had one of those fantasies where you’ve become wildly successful—you’re rich, you’re famous—and you get to sneer and look down on all those people who used to be so awful to you.
For Lorde, that dream has come true. Thanks in large part to the huge success of her latest album, Melodrama (which debuted at No. 1 in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand), the singer managed to land a spot on the cover of this month’s issue of Vogue Australia.
If you keep up with pop culture at all, this isn’t exactly surprising. Since the release of her massively popular debut single “Royals” in mid-2013, Lorde’s combination of catchy hooks, social commentary, and distinctive public image have made her—without exaggeration—an international superstar. By November of that year, Time magazine had named her one of the year’s “Most Influential Teens.” In January of 2014, she made it onto Forbes‘ “30 Under 30” list, and in October of the same year, she was in Time again, this time being called one of the “25 Most Influential Teens of 2014.”
What you might not know, though, is that Lorde endured her fair share of bullying growing up in New Zealand.
Last week, she tweeted a photo of the upcoming issue’s cover, captioned “VOGUE BABY AHHH!” which she followed up by saying, “it’s literally f***ed that i could be on the cover of vogue i used to get called monobrow at school that BROW IS ON THE COVER OF VOGUE.”
And she’s not the only one embracing her natural brow growth. Earlier this month actress Yara Shahidi posted her own “Unibrow appreciation post” to Instagram, which has since received over 124,000 likes and more than 800 supportive comments. Instagram stars Sophia Hadjipanteli and Scarlet Costello are likewise saying “No thanks” to plucking their unibrows, instead opting to show off their natural brows.
Lorde’s also not the only celebrity who spent much of their childhood getting bullied.
In a 2011 interview with Rolling Stone, Lady Gaga told the magazine about the bullying she endured during her time at Convent of the Sacred Heart, an expensive all-girls Catholic school in New York City’s Upper East Side. There, she said, her fellow students mocked her for “Being ugly, having a big nose,” and “being annoying.”
“Your laugh is funny, you’re weird, why do you always sing, why are you so into theater, why do you do your makeup like that, what’s with your eyebrows,” she said, impersonating her bullies, going on to say, “I didn’t even want to go to school sometimes.”
Jennifer Lawrence likewise told UK magazine The Sun, “I changed schools a lot when I was in elementary school because some girls were mean.” She went on to say, “They were less mean in middle school, because I was doing alright, although this one girl gave me invitations to hand out to her birthday party that I wasn’t invited to.”
Her reaction? “I just hocked a loogie on them and threw then in the trash can.”