I had a front-row seat to Perez Hilton’s rise, and the private struggle no one saw

I have known Perez Hilton since 2004, before Perez became a global brand, a cultural lightning rod, or the face people attached to an entire era of internet gossip. We are three months apart in age and I am lucky enough to call him one of my close friends.

In the days since Perez attempted to take his own life, I have watched an extraordinary debate unfold online. Alongside the messages of concern and compassion, there have been comments calling what happened to him “karma” or punishment for the hurt he caused during the years when PerezHilton.com was at the center of celebrity culture.

I understand the anger behind some of those reactions. I also know something about the man at the center of them.

Outside of our friendship, I was also Perez’s publicist for 10 years. During the height of his fame, we spoke almost every day. I had a front-row seat to his rise, his mistakes and, more importantly, his guilt as he tried to grapple with the consequences of the way he had covered people in the past. I watched becoming a father change him. And I watched the real person, Mario Lavandeira, emerge from behind the character the world knew as Perez Hilton.

That is why I feel compelled to speak now. The person being judged today is not simply the person people remember from a website two decades ago. None of us can rewrite our past, but I believe we have to allow people the possibility of becoming something more than the things they may have done.

To really understand Perez Hilton, you also have to remember what celebrity media looked like at the time. Perez did not create that culture by himself; he just became its most visible face.

We were all addicted to celebrity gossip, and still are today. Millions visited PerezHilton.com, refreshed the headlines, repeated the stories and came back for more. Celebrities wanted his attention. Publicists and agents sought coverage for their clients. Advertisers followed the audience. Mario played a powerful role in that machine, but he never operated alone.

Perez has acknowledged the harm he caused. In 2010, he changed course, risked the platform he had built, and publicly committed himself to doing better.

I saw that change happen privately. It changed the conversations we had and the decisions he made.

Accountability matters. And Perez took it. But if accountability offers no possibility of redemption, it is not accountability. It is permanent punishment.

And that is where I struggle with some of what I have read over the past week.

I’m not writing this to tell anyone they have to forgive him. I’m writing because there is a line between accountability and believing another human being deserves to suffer so profoundly that they no longer deserve to live.

Whatever you might think of Perez Hilton, what happened last week was not karma. It was a mental health crisis. And no suicide attempt should ever be celebrated as justice.

Over the past week, as my friend was at his most vulnerable and his family was trying to protect him and his children, his suffering was playing out in front of millions of people.

His video showing self-harm remained on TikTok for more than fifteen minutes. Strangers watched, shared, commented and passed judgment on one of the darkest moments of his life.

Compassion doesn’t require us to forget someone’s past. It simply requires us to remember there is still a human being behind it.

I witnessed Perez’s rise, his mistakes, his decision to change, and the sixteen years he has spent living under a weight of public judgment that, at times, has made him feel as if he was not worthy of being alive.

That is what saddens me most: not just what was said about him, but what it may have made him believe about himself.

For further updates on Perez Hilton from his family, please go to perezhilton.com.

If you or someone you know needs help in the US, please call or text the confidential 24/7 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988.