A social media campaign to catch the attention of Canadian pop star Justin Bieber has now spread across the globe.
On Wednesday, a pair of Australian women joined in the effort to have the world famous singer pay tribute to their cousin, Taylor Steyn, who was killed in a Surrey car crash on Good Friday.
Jenna and Julianne Behr posted a YouTube video — which joins another posted earlier this week by Steyn’s friend Jake Vandermeer — asking the singer to dedicate a performance of My Girl by the Temptations to their cousin’s memory.
“As funny as it sounds, she was a 21-year-old with a bucket list that involved Justin Bieber,” said Jenna.
“Her wish was that he would follow her on Twitter, mention her in a tweet or reply to her 300 tweets on his birthday.”
Steyn had apparently planned to get a tattoo of lyrics from the song on her ribs. The line “I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day” perfectly captured her life, Julianne said, describing Steyn as having “an ever-optimistic bright smile and infectious laugh.
“She was absolutely obsessed with Justin Bieber, a quirk which many of us didn’t understand.”
Quoting a letter written by Steyn’s brother, Miles, which is posted below their video, the girls said that Bieber’s music “meant everything to her, she meant everything to us. And so now, in a way, his music has become a part of our family.”
Their immediate goal is to have as many people as possible tweet #taysbeliebers to Bieber at noon today (Wednesday April 11) in an effort to have the singer acknowledge Steyn in some way.
Having Bieber comment, follow her on Twitter or somehow make mention of her would mean the world to her family and friends, said the cousins.
Earlier this week, Vandermeer posted his own YouTube video titled “Help us find Justin Bieber” asking for help to contact the singer, in the hope of getting a video message or having a note posted to Steyn’s Twitter account or on her Facebook wall for her friends to see.
“Really, anything at all that we could use in a celebration of (her) life,” said Vandermeer on the video, which had surpassed 25,000 views by Wednesday morning.
They have also set up a public Facebook page titled Taylor’s Beliebers.
