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Lauren Southern’s “This is Not Real Life” – Review by Luke Schulz

Aug 10, 2025 |

Screenshot 2025-08-10 at 9.58.10 AMThe Private Implosion and Quest for Redemption of a Notorious Public Figure
Lauren Southern’s This is not Real Life – A Memoir in Review
Review by Luke Schulz
 
Full disclosure: I know Lauren Southern personally. We have never been close, but back before she went viral, she and I were both first-year political science majors at UFV. Early on she rose to internet fame, and then she disappeared from my life save for a few chance encounters (most recently at Jordan Peterson’s lecture in Abbotsford, BC). We have mutual friends, and a mutual mentor in Ron Dart, and through those channels I have heard snippets from behind the scenes of her ever so dramatic life. All of them have aligned with the accounts in this book.
                   
Lauren could not be overlooked. In her rhetoric she was fearless; the diversity-inclusivity crowd was increasingly intolerant of her provocations toward their orthodoxy. I believe it was Peterson who quipped “people get very upset when you poke them in their axioms.” For Lauren, this was as much a sport as it was a compulsion to force a referendum on prevailing narratives that concerned her. Whatever was deemed sacred by the politically-correct found itself in her crosshairs, and she rarely misses. As far as I can say, Lauren Southern’s rise was for better or worse an uncalculated, and unvarnished ascent. She was then no secret liberal or feminist, and those shifts in her rhetoric appear to me to have been changes due to authentic growth and trying experiences, not a revelation that she has been a fraud this whole time.
 
Bono once wrote of the King’s fate that: “Elvis ate America before America ate him.” You might say that Lauren Southern ate the internet before it ate her. The same mechanism that propelled her to notoriety is now that which will likely never set her free. Her audience and critics alike expect a certain persona and demand that the leopard cannot change its spots. Elvis’ real passion was gospel music, but the weight of infamy, the demands of the industry, and the expectations of his followers incentivized his continued portrayal as the King of Rock and Roll, until, it seems, his private sorrow consumed him. Lauren’s fall from conservative grace-land has been along those same lines. She always wanted to get to something deeper, more meaningful, but in some ways felt pressured to churn out the content she was known for. Her desire to move on to still waters and green pastures is today hotly debated online.
 
When I first heard of the project, I naturally thought “what business does a 30-year-old have writing an autobiography?” Au contraire, This is not Real Life is part Guy Ritchie film, part Greek tragicomedy, part espionage thriller. It contains an incredible trove of behind-the-scenes moments that shed light on the inner-workings of influencer media. Tea has been spilled. Even if you know nothing about Lauren Southern, many of the chapters of this book will fascinate you.
Through it all, comes the tale of a young millennial propelled by, then consumed by, the then new phenomenon of YouTube fame. Deep beneath the provocative public persona lays the story of a woman yet to truly know herself, the nature of new media, or the cynicism of the political realm. She has run what famed music producer Daniel Lanois dubbed “a twisted mile.” For a person with such a concretized online image, there are no straight paths here.
 
This is not Real Life reads like the cathartic confession of a formerly naïve but fearless adrenaline junkie and provocateur who is now desperately looking to turn the page. It is a journalled attempt to expel the toxicity of the past and break through into the next chapter of life. There is a clear longing to outlive a legacy fraught with contradictions, a raw lament at errors made, and an attempt to, despite courting controversy, set certain records straight. Lauren does not hold back from self-criticism and expressions of regret. The authentic, emotional, reflective style of the writing compel the reader onward.
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