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Turkish social media figure and awareness advocate Ebru Erdem poses for a portrait in Istanbul, Türkiye. Known online as "Avatar Woman," Erdem leverages years of appearance-based mockery to drive a public campaign encouraging people to accept physical differences.
Erdem's earliest memories of ridicule trace back to preschool and primary school, the years she describes as the harshest period of bullying in her life. Classmates greet her not with names but with a running joke, one that follows her through the school gates every morning.
In primary school, children announce her arrival with the same phrase over and over: an alien has come, an alien is in the classroom. Erdem recalls the comments less as insults and more as a daily reminder that she is seen as something other than human.
The nickname that eventually defines her online persona begins in childhood, when her facial features draw comparisons to characters from the film Avatar. Some classmates mistake the resemblance for a disability, an assumption Erdem says reflects poorly on how society treats disabled people as much as it does her.
As Erdem grows older, the mockery migrates to social media, where strangers comment directly on her appearance. Some suggest she pay for cosmetic surgery if she can afford it, while others offer to raise money for the procedure if she cannot. She reads the messages, she says, in utter disbelief.
Despite the volume of unsolicited advice, Erdem says she has never once considered surgery. She states she would decline the procedure regardless of her financial means, insisting she has loved her face since birth and refuses to alter it simply because others judge or disapprove.
Erdem's family raises the subject only out of concern for her well-being, asking whether the constant commentary from strangers affects her. She tells them it does not, and adds that she is not opposed in principle to cosmetic procedures; she simply has no desire to undergo one herself.
Friends offer some support along the way, though Erdem describes most of her journey as a solitary one. She says she has faced more attempts to discourage her than encouragement, and that pushing forward has largely been a battle she has fought on her own terms.
Erdem singles out women as the source of her harshest online criticism, noting she has faced far more public shaming from them than from men. She argues that women should support one another rather than tear each other down, though her own experiences reflect the exact opposite pattern.
Erdem has rebranded the years of mockery under the identity "Avatar Woman," using her platform to encourage others with distinctive features to embrace rather than hide their appearance. She says she remains content with how she looks and hopes to one day take on a role in an Avatar film.
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