To be a doctor, you need to go to medical school. To be an airline pilot, you need to clock up 1,500 hours of flight experience. So it stands to reason that, to be a professional advice-giver, you should surely have had some direct experience of the problems you\u2019re pontificating on. <\/p>\n
Enter: Hannah Ingram-Moore, in her latest incarnation<\/a> as TikTok motivational guru. Surely, if anyone knows a thing or two about keeping your chin up when the world is against you (rightly or wrongly), it\u2019s her.\u00a0<\/p>\n Since the death of her centenarian father Captain Tom<\/a> in 2021, who was practically sainted by the country after he raised \u00a338 million for NHS charities by walking laps around his garden during Covid, Ingram-Moore has stumbled from scandal to scandal \u2013 from building an unapproved home spa to seemingly pocketing money the public believed would go to charity. It appears she can hardly turn around without causing an outcry.\u00a0<\/p>\n While I understand the thinking that such shiftiness ought to disqualify her from claiming to be an authority on anything, I\u2019d actually argue the opposite. In her new, snappily-titled series, Moore Moments, videos full of background noise \u2013 radical authenticity, yas queen! \u2013 offer stirring nuggets of wisdom, from \u201cwe are not always in control\u201d to \u201cfinding comfort in friends\u201d. When it comes to staggering self-belief, Ingram-Moore has long walked the walk \u2013 here she is talking the talk. <\/p>\n On negativity: \u201cDon\u2019t ignore it. Ask, where is this really coming from?\u201d\u00a0Self-belief:\u00a0\u201cTrust your instincts; you know more than you think.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>OK, so much of Ingram-Moore\u2019s advice is generic \u2013 but still, I\u2019d rather it was her giving it to me than the average Insta-guru.\u00a0<\/p>\n After all, the online self-help space is brimming with live-laugh-love platitudes, dispensed by glossy 20-somethings who\u2019ve never had a pimple, let alone an actual problem. Thin, preternaturally beautiful women wax lyrical about body positivity; people with trust funds and sponsorship deals spout patronising bullshit about the power of hard work and\/or manifestation (not sure which is more infuriating, let me get back to you).<\/p>\n Word salad is always exhausting, but surely the blow is somewhat cushioned if it\u2019s coming from someone who\u2019s been there and built the unauthorised spa pool, as the old saying goes.<\/p>\n Ingram-Moore is yet to offer advice on her truly specialist subjects \u2013 I look forward to videos with titles such as \u201cplanning permission: best work-arounds\u201d. I like to think she\u2019s building up to them, but in the meantime, who could doubt her credentials to speak on weathering disapproval or staying calm in a crisis?<\/p>\n It\u2019s worth remembering, too, that, far from being simply tedious, internet gurus can do real and profound damage. Take Belle Gibson, who attracted wealth and fame for her online claims of curing cancer with food, convincing followers to forsake conventional medicine in the process. Meanwhile, manosphere types like Andrew Tate spout misogynist bile, inspiring hatred that ripples far beyond the internet.<\/p>\n While Ingram-Moore is just getting started, and I guess there\u2019s always the chance that things could get weird (in which case, I\u2019ll be here with popcorn), there\u2019s no sign of her committing any crimes beyond triteness and bad lighting. What\u2019s more, the woman has got to make a living somehow \u2013 banned from serving as a charity trustee<\/a> and presumably not getting many calls back from job applications given her prevailing unpopularity, who can blame her for trying her hand at a new gig?<\/p>\n It\u2019s tempting to dismiss Ingram-Moore\u2019s reinvention as a shallow bid for attention, or an attempt to rehabilitate her reputation \u2013 and, hey, sure. Yet it\u2019s also true that she has surfed the countless waves of public contempt and turned that notoriety to her advantage. Not only has her infamy given Ingram-Moore a sizeable readymade audience \u2013 10,000 followers and counting, proof that all publicity is good publicity \u2013 but the inarguable stripes to back up what she\u2019s saying too. <\/p>\n TikTok is full of self-styled gurus, with little life experience and even less of value to say. At least Ingram-Moore has the former on her side, even if no one else is. <\/p>\n