‘I Have Cancer,' the TikTok Star Said. Then Came the Torrent of Hate.

New York Times

01-05-2025

By the time Sydney Towle graduated from Dartmouth College in 2022, she had a growing social media side hustle.
On TikTok, where she posted videos, her fans watched her perform dance moves in her kitchen and lip-sync to popular songs. She modeled clothing and posed in bikinis on the beach. She gallivanted around Europe with friends.
Within a year, she was an influencer in full, with more than 450,000 followers.
But her content took a sharp turn in August 2023. In a pink bikini top, her face stained with tears, she spoke directly to the camera. 'I have cancer,' she said. 'I am strong, so I'll be good.' She flashed a thumbs-up and an awkward smile.
Her diagnosis, she said, was cholangiocarcinoma, a rare and aggressive cancer of the bile ducts.
Ms. Towle's social media posts grew more frequent and personal, as she joined the ranks of influencers in what is known as CancerTok. She made videos of herself exploring New York City, where she said she had moved to be close to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center; struggling with exhaustion and nausea she attributed to chemotherapy; and crying in grief for the carefree life she no longer led. And her growing online fan base — before long, she had more than 760,000 followers — routinely cheered her on:
'We are all rooting hard for you girl!!!' one person posted on TikTok. 'Keep up the good fight.'
'Your positive outlook through all of this inspires me daily,' another said.
But on Reddit, in a more skeptical and caustic corner of the internet, an army of angry critics was assembling.
'I literally feel like punching her in the face,' wrote one commenter.
Ms. Towle's antagonists had quickly concluded that she was leveraging her story of illness for public sympathy and financial benefit. They scrutinized her every word and image, building a case that she was misleading the public.
Many accused her of faking cancer altogether.
Ms. Towle, 25, is now at the center of an intense social media collision that reveals the best intentions and worst instincts of the internet — where isolated strangers can become support systems in times of crisis and sleuths labor obsessively to root out scammers.
But in an online economy that feeds off emotion and internet addiction, it's not always clear who is manipulating whom.
'No defending Syd'
In mid-March, Ms. Towle posted a video in which she appears to be at a chemotherapy appointment. She is pictured next to an IV pole, vomit bag in hand, bopping to the beat of 'Nokia' by Drake.
Several days later, she posted another video, this time inviting her followers along on an adventure. 'This is us before going scuba diving in the ocean — for the first time,' she says, standing next to her brother, Austin, against a bright blue sky and the Caribbean Sea. In the next scene, they're wearing wet suits. 'This is us, after our first dive.' They were in Jamaica for a friend's wedding.
On Reddit, Ms. Towle's critics saw the stark juxtaposition as evidence that she was not, in fact, sick.
'Syd must WANT to be outed,' one person wrote.
'Don't worry, she'll be back with the fake nausea and baby voice in no time,' another responded.
'Snark pages' on Reddit, also known as 'snark subreddits,' are designated forums where people congregate under the veil of anonymity to critique and mock influencers and celebrities. In some cases, they become skeptical of the influencers they follow and fixated on exposing inconsistencies in their narratives.
A snark page devoted to Sydney Towle appeared last fall, just as she was moving to Manhattan. Ms. Towle marked the occasion of her move with an upbeat video showing her dancing on a city street against the backdrop of Taylor Swift's 'Welcome to New York.'
'Does something feel off to you about Syd Towle's cancer story?' the subreddit asked. The group's rules included 'Be respectful to each other' and 'No defending Syd.'
Six months later, SydTowleSnark had more than 1,000 members, a relatively small group but one with an active core. It was filled with thousands of comments criticizing Ms. Towle's public postings — from the way she characterized the severity of her illness to the appearance of dirt beneath her fingernails.
Mostly, the commenters focused on their certainty that she was a cancer scammer, like the frauds who have been the subject of the recent documentaries 'Scamanda' on Hulu and 'Anatomy of Lies' on Peacock, as well as Netflix's 'Apple Cider Vinegar,' which is based on a true story.
'Sydney Towle & Scamanda: Are the Parallels Too Obvious to Ignore?' asked one post.
'She lies about everything,' another said.
Ms. Towle's critics pointed to her long hair and her penchant for travel and fitness as proof that she could not possibly have the illness she claimed. They saw contradictions in her treatment, including that she did not undergo chemotherapy for much of 2024, despite what she described as a grave diagnosis.
They created a 28-page timeline of medical details shared by Ms. Towle online, using it to bolster their claims of fakery. They zoomed in on photos showing a large scar on her abdomen to search for signs of photoshopping.
When they were unable to see in Ms. Towle's videos any signs of a port — a medical device implanted in patients to facilitate chemotherapy treatments and ease blood draws — they took it as a certainty she was lying. When she posted a video showing a port implanted not on her upper chest, which is common, but on the underside of her arm, they remained skeptical.
They complained that she was too upbeat. 'I hate her toxic positivity,' one person posted. 'I don't believe a word she says.'
And they accused her of manufacturing emotion on camera to manipulate sympathetic followers. A person using the Reddit handle Beginning_Field_2421 put it this way: 'No matter how innocent or saccharine she tries to appear on social media, there's still a predatory edge to what she is doing.'
Beginning_Field_2421 did not create the SydTowleSnark page, but she became one of its most active and impassioned members, posting lengthy commentaries.
'We have receipts, medical analysis, fact-checking and discussions,' she wrote, urging people to 'join the conversation and tell us how you found us and why you may have doubts.' She shared posts with headings like 'Sydney Towle — Were you lying then or now?' and 'How to spot when Sydney Towle is lying: Her biggest tells,' which cataloged Ms. Towle's 'slow blinks, pauses & squinting.'
Sometimes her comments were short and scathing: 'I've never disbelieved or hated this phony b more than today. That's it.'
Some of the commenters claimed to be health care professionals; others compared their experiences of living through a loved one's cancer, or their own. Many were armed with only an internet education in cholangiocarcinoma — 'a rare and aggressive type of cancer,' according to Google, that 'often affects adults in their 70s' and carries a 'usually poor' prognosis in cases in which the cancer has advanced, as was true of Ms. Towle's cancer, according to her videos.
Ms. Towle's critics did not seem concerned about the effect of their hostility. 'If she fabricated any part of her story, it's deeply unethical, and she deserves backlash,' Beginning_Field_2421 wrote. 'Being a public figure comes with scrutiny — it's part of the job.'
'Let's go slay some chemo!'
On many Tuesday mornings, Ms. Towle leans her phone against a mirror in her East Village walk-up, hits the record button and films a 'get ready with me' video.
GRWMs, as they are known on social media, are bedrocks of the TikTok canon in which people share their daily primping routines. Sometimes Ms. Towle chats with viewers as she slathers rejuvenating oil on her skin and brushes her eyebrows. Often, she flashes her moisturizers and mascaras on the screen, in calculated product placement.
But on these Tuesdays, her videos usually begin the same way. She smiles toward the camera and says brightly, 'Let's go slay some chemo!'
Sharing her experiences publicly is her way of processing the trials of life, she said in an interview, a habit that began well before she started making cancer videos. In college, she noted, she wrote for the school newspaper about her struggles with an eating disorder.
The videos, she said, give her purpose when she does not want to get out of bed. They connect her to others whom she can inspire and be inspired by.
They also help her pay the bills.
Like many influencers, Ms. Towle is sometimes paid by brands when she features their products. She also draws revenue from a TikTok program in which those who have more than 10,000 followers and meet eligibility requirements are paid a commission based on how many views their videos draw. In the past year, TikTok has paid her about $20,000, according to a financial statement reviewed by The New York Times.
She also works on the social media team of a large gaming company, a full-time job that allows her to work remotely and provides health insurance.
Still, her TikTok fans regularly urge her to let them contribute money toward her care, and sometimes she adds a link to an Amazon wish list to her TikTok bio for Uber Eats, Airbnb and Amtrak gift cards.
'I have not begged people for money,' she said this winter. 'I didn't start TikTok and then ask people to pay my hospital bills. I've never started a GoFundMe.'
But Ms. Towle's detractors consider any financial benefit an enormous grift.
'I find her obscene and offensive,' a Reddit user wrote recently. 'To see her manipulate people for money, when there are REAL people out there with REAL cancer juggling REAL problems, disgusts me.'
Celebration, not Castigation
To Ghassan Abou-Alfa, all of this is madness.
He is a Yale-trained oncologist who specializes in liver cancer and bile duct tumors at one of the nation's leading cancer hospitals.
He is also Ms. Towle's doctor.
'She has cancer,' Dr. Abou-Alfa confirmed in an interview at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan.
As Ms. Towle was down the hall getting chemotherapy and simultaneously logged into video meetings for work, Dr. Abou-Alfa explained the details of his patient's intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma.
It started in the bile ducts in the liver, and after surgery to remove the original tumor, the cancer has recurred in her liver. The disease has also been detected in lymph nodes next to her liver. Dr. Abou-Alfa prefers not to label a 25-year-old who is responding well to treatment. But strictly speaking, she has Stage 4 cancer.
Ms. Towle, Dr. Abou-Alfa said, is helping to shine a light on an emerging face of cancer, one that is young and is neither near death nor cured.
Even when receiving chemotherapy and immunotherapy, some patients can maintain a fairly normal schedule, he said. 'We literally have people who come to us for treatment on their lunchtime from the office and then go back to work,' he said. 'Patients really can live with cancer. Not everybody should be looking as if they are dying.'
Not necessarily every patient is thriving, or tolerating chemotherapy as well as Ms. Towle, Dr. Abou-Alfa made clear. But a number are — which is cause for celebration, he said, not castigation.
'A young patient like Sydney, or at any age really, can keep going and look very good,' he said. 'But it does not undermine that she's still living with a very serious matter.'
Told that skeptics on Reddit believed Ms. Towle was lying about her diagnosis because she looked too healthy and was taking part in behavior they deemed risky, he hung his head low and shook it in disbelief.
His advice to Ms. Towle, he said, has been this: The point of undergoing treatment for cancer is to preserve and prolong life, and she should live hers.
'Always what I tell her is, 'We want to steal from you one day per week'' for treatment. 'That's when you're a sick person. We have to keep the other six days for you.'
If a patient feels too sick to do something, she should listen to her body. 'Logic matters,' he said.
But if she has the energy to run 10 miles, he said, she can run 10 miles. If she wants to travel, he said, 'I would only be bothered if she thinks about cancer while she is away.'
'Is this normal?'
Ms. Towle first noticed a bulge in her abdomen while she was out running, in 2023. She took a Snapchat picture captioned 'Is this normal?' and sent it to a friend.
Then she did what many young people do when they have a medical concern: nothing.
A month or two later, she felt a burning sensation in the area where she had seen the bulge. She went to urgent care. About a month later, she was diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma. She was 23.
At the time, Ms. Towle was living in Los Angeles, and she began treatment for cancer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. After treatments of chemotherapy and immunotherapy — during which she posted videos of her mother wrapping her head with ice packs to help her avoid hair loss — she underwent surgery. Her gall bladder and a large part of her liver were removed, according to a review of her medical records by The Times.
Tests showed it was medically appropriate for her to receive follow-up regimens of chemotherapy and immunotherapy. But because of the effect of the chemotherapy on her white blood cell count, her doctor recommended that she pause treatment, according to medical records.
On break from active treatment, Ms. Towle planned a three-week trip to Europe. She posted dozens of videos, exploring Barcelona, hiking Caminito del Rey and getting recognized in Málaga by TikTok followers.
But when she returned, scans showed another tumor.
Last fall, she moved to New York to be treated by Dr. Abou-Alfa. On TikTok, she received encouragement and prayers. 'I love your videos, love how positive you are and look forward to your new experiences in New York City!!!' one said.
But elsewhere on the internet, anonymous commenters were discussing why someone with cancer would take a break from treatment for a vacation, only to return to make dramatic videos about her worsening illness.
They ignored her truthful dispatches that answered such skepticism and decided that they did not believe her.
'I'm not a television show'
Ms. Towle cannot fully understand or explain the anger that her videos incite. But TikTok's blend of truth and fiction — authenticity and marketing — probably plays a role, she said.
Off camera, Ms. Towle can be quiet and serious. Sitting on the edge of the bed in her studio apartment recently, she sipped an oat milk matcha latte and reflected on her online persona.
'I'm not a television show that you're watching, which I think people have a really hard time understanding,' she said. 'I'm not a fake character. I'm a person.'
She is unwilling to be bullied off social media, she said.
Making videos motivates her through difficult times. 'I literally get stopped in the street,' she said. 'I'll get stopped at chemo. I'll get messages and comments from people being like, 'You have no idea how the videos you're posting keep me going.''
In interviews, cancer activists and Ms. Towle's family, friends, colleagues and health care providers said they were proud of the inspiration she was providing to others throughout her illness.
But by winter, the online vitriol had intensified:
'There is something about her looks that annoys me.'
'Sydney's lies trivialize the real experiences of patients and their families. She is making money off of your suffering.'
'All of this is eventually going to catch up with her, whether she goes on to pretend to kill herself off or miraculously heals.'
The anger soon leaked out of the internet and into real life. Beginning_Field_2421 urged people to complain about Ms. Towle to the companies whose products she endorsed, and also suggested that Reddit commenters show up at a cancer research fund-raiser in New York that Ms. Towle would be attending. Someone else suggested sending her photograph to cancer hospitals, implying that they need to be alerted to a potential fraudster. Another contacted the Jamaica scuba company where she and her brother had gone diving, inquiring about the protocol for allowing cancer patients to participate.
On Christmas Eve, Ms. Towle brought her nurses some chocolates and turned the moment into a video. Then, a skin care company asked if it could send her gift bags to present to the nurses. She agreed — and turned that into a video, too.
Soon after, Memorial Sloan Kettering received an anonymous complaint from someone using an email account called [e-mail]. The writer claimed she was a patient at the cancer center and said she believed Ms. Towle was receiving special treatment as a result of the gift-giving. (Someone using the same email address, meanwhile, was reaching out to Ms. Towle's fans on TikTok, urging them to join the Reddit dissection of her truthfulness.)
The next time Ms. Towle arrived for chemotherapy, a hospital administrator took her aside and asked her not to bring any more gifts.
In early February, 'Apple Cider Vinegar' began to stream on Netflix and quickly became a hit. The show is based on the story of Belle Gibson, an Australian influencer who built a lucrative wellness business by claiming to have cured her own cancer through nutrition.
As the series grew popular, Ms. Towle noticed a surge in criticism, even on TikTok. 'My comments have been so inundated with people being like, 'You will burn in hell. You are lying,'' she said. Among the messages, she added, were death threats.
She felt stuck in a cycle she had helped to create. If she quit social media, she feared her followers would believe she had something to hide. If she continued to post emotional updates, they would say she was cravenly seeking sympathy to gin up engagement. If she stopped talking about cancer in her videos, her detractors would say she was too upbeat. 'I'm sorry that they are so angry that living with cancer can look different than they think it should,' she said.
'No matter what I do, these people move the goal posts.'
Snark vs. SnarkSnark
But the internet loves a fight and eventually an anti-anti-Sydney contingent began to gather steam.
In late February, a new Reddit group — SydTowleSnarkSnark — was created in part to criticize Ms. Towle's critics, who, some believed, were harassing her.
Several people reported the original snark page to Reddit administrators, flagging various comments and specific people whose posts seemed alarmingly aggressive, including Beginning_Field_2421.
Reddit told them that the content of the snark page did not violate any rules. It also warned at least one person that she was 'abusing' the reporting tool. (After Reddit was contacted by The Times, it removed some comments that it considered 'harassing,' according to a spokeswoman who said that administrators were 'in error' when they originally said there had been no violations.)
One woman in the Midwest became so disgusted by the venom directed at Ms. Towle and by Reddit's apparent apathy that she took action.
She spent hours trying to glean the identities of the most frequent anonymous critics, all of whom communicate on Reddit via cryptic handles, such as No-Veterinarian6552, Spirited_Coach7832 and FarTransportation152.
The woman, a nurse who has worked with cancer patients, spoke to The Times on the condition of anonymity so that she did not open herself to online bullying. She sleuthed out the real identities of nearly a dozen active Reddit skeptics of Ms. Towle by cross-referencing personal details they shared in comments with information on Google, Instagram, LinkedIn and even the interior photographs of a home seen in a Zillow listing.
There was a woman who works at a fintech company, a woman who runs a day care center for children, a self-described yogi and a woman whose nephew died of cancer.
Beginning_Field_2421, among the most persistent critics, was a woman named Connie Wright, the privacy officer for Valley Health System, headquartered in Bergen County, N.J., where she shapes and manages the organization's patient privacy practices, according to her LinkedIn profile.
In a message sent to The Times on Reddit, Ms. Wright, 53, said, 'I've remained anonymous to avoid backlash or reputational harm from a public figure with a large and active online following.' She then deleted her account.
The Times also contacted several other participants in the snark page. Those who responded asked not to be included in this article. Some stopped posting or deleted their social media accounts altogether.
'My cancer knowledge is extremely limited,' one of Ms. Towle's frequent critics texted. 'Please respect my privacy.'
'Lessen the load'
In April, Ms. Towle was a featured speaker at a conference of the Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation in Salt Lake City.
'The things that people say behind the protection of their phone are horrifying,' she said in her speech. 'I never thought that I would receive the level of hate that I have in sharing my journey.' She received a standing ovation from a rapt audience.
But her return to the drudgery of chemotherapy several days later was a difficult comedown.
'I'm so overwhelmed,' she sobbed in a worrisome TikTok video. 'I'm so tired.'
There was no sympathy on Reddit — where even Ms. Towle's speech at a cancer conference had not persuaded many that she had cancer. 'Grifting and manipulating is very overwhelming,' Ms. Wright posted under her Beginning_Field_2421 account, along with an unflattering screenshot of Ms. Towle as she cried.
But on TikTok, fans expressed concern. Supporters left more than 3,000 comments, many of them asking if they could sit with her during chemotherapy, send her food or give her money.
'Syd — I see you,' wrote the actress and activist Alyssa Milano. 'We all love you. Start a GoFundMe so you can take care of yourself and not worry about work. Lessen the load.'
The next morning, via video, Ms. Towle announced a decision that stirred up her fans and critics alike.
'I'm starting a GoFundMe, a very small one,' she said, stifling tears. She said she intended to raise $2,500 for a birthday vacation for her mother, a federal employee recently laid off by DOGE.
Donations poured in. 'I don't care what my donation would be used for, Syd, I don't think any of us do,' wrote one supporter.
But the Reddit community lost its mind.
'Vile,' wrote one commenter. 'I thought I'd heard it all until now.'
'Her followers are some of the most gullible people out there,' another said.
In less than 24 hours, supporters donated $41,000, and Ms. Towle stopped accepting contributions.
She was overwhelmed by the outpouring, she told her followers.
After taking her brother and mother to the Grand Canyon, she said, she would use the remaining money to pay travel and hotel expenses for her mother to be with her in New York when she had chemotherapy.
On TikTok, many people urged her to reopen the fund. 'Don't steal our joy of being able to donate,' one wrote. 'Open it back up!'
In an interview, Ms. Towle said she felt torn between her followers' enthusiasm and the fact that she did not truly need donations. 'It's hard to say that I wish I hadn't done it, or that I wish I hadn't started this whole life on social media,' she said. 'It's obviously brought so many good things. But there's just so much stress behind the scenes that people don't see.'
A day after shutting down the fund-raiser, she made another video. 'After talking to my mom for a while,' she said, 'I've decided to reopen the GoFundMe.'
After five days, her TikTok fans had donated more than $75,000.
The grousing on the snark page was short-lived. Last week, a day after The Times sent Reddit a detailed inquiry about its inaction, the company abruptly shut down the group.
In its place was the image of a gavel. SydTowleSnark, the company announced, was officially banned.