politics
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Lizzo is once again using her platform to speak out about important issues. This time, she’s reminding followers not to lose focus when it comes to the numerous political shifts happening all at once in the United States, from the government’s plan to potentially ban TikTok to the resurgence of outdated anti-LGBTQ and Jim Crow era laws.
“Hi!” the 34-year-old musician wrote on her social media platforms Thursday (March 23), going on to list out three concerning developments that are playing out “as we speak.”
“The ceo of tiktok is being interrogated by congress with intent to ban TikTok in America,” she continued. “Anti lgbtqia legislation is being passed banning gender affirming health care & drag shows.”
And finally, “Jim Crow era laws are being reinstated in Mississippi,” referring to a bill passed earlier this month by the state’s House proposing that judges in Hinds County Circuit Court in Jackson be appointed by the Mississippi Supreme Court chief justice — a conservative white man — rather than the city’s predominantly Black population, who for years have chosen the judges themselves through elections.
The “About Damn Time” singer’s latest tweet came the same day members of Congress grilled TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew for hours about ByteDance, the social media platform’s parent company, and its alleged ties to the Chinese government, which both Democrats and Republicans worry pose a threat to user privacy and national security. The Biden administration has even put forward pending legislation that would give the president the power to ban TikTok nationwide if ByteDance doesn’t divest its stake in the app.
Chew and other spokespeople for the platform, however, have been adamant that ByteDance has never shared, or been asked to share, user data with the Chinese government.
Meanwhile, anti-LGBTQ — specifically, anti-trans and anti-drag — laws have been cropping up across the U.S., most notably in Tennessee. The state’s governor, Bill Lee, recently signed controversial laws banning minors from receiving gender-affirming care and preventing drag queens from performing in certain public spaces, which numerous musicians have publicly denounced.
Lizzo herself spoke about transphobia in a tweet earlier this month, writing, “I’ve never heard a reason why someone is transphobic.. I think if we knew ‘why’ these people felt this way there would way less support for these ideals.” “The ‘why’ is more insidious than we realize,” she’d added.
See Lizzo’s tweet about the TikTok hearing and anti-LGBTQ legislation and the resurgence of Jim Crow laws below:
Hi! As we speak:– the ceo of tiktok is being interrogated by congress with intent to ban TikTok in America – anti lgbtqia legislation is being passed banning gender affirming health care & drag shows– Jim Crow era laws are being reinstated in Mississippi— FOLLOW @YITTY (@lizzo) March 23, 2023
The CEO of TikTok faced a grilling Thursday from a U.S. congressional committee in a rare public appearance where made his own case for why the hugely popular video-sharing app shouldn’t be banned.
Shou Zi Chew’s testimony came at a crucial time for the company, which has acquired 150 million American users but is under increasing pressure from U.S. officials. TikTok and its parent company ByteDance have been swept up in a wider geopolitical battle between Beijing and Washington over trade and technology.
“Mr. Chew, you are here because the American people need the truth about the threat TikTok poses to our national and personal security,” Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican, said in her opening statement. “TikTok has repeatedly chosen a path for more control, more surveillance and more manipulation.”
Chew, a 40-year-old Singapore native, told the House Committee on Energy and Commerce that TikTok prioritizes the safety of its young users and denied allegations that the app is a national security risk. He reiterated the company’s plan to protect U.S. user data by storing all such information on servers maintained and owned by the server giant Oracle.
“Let me state this unequivocally: ByteDance is not an agent of China or any other country,” Chew said.
On Wednesday, the company sent dozens of popular TikTokers to Capitol Hill to lobby lawmakers to preserve the platform. It has also been putting up ads all over Washington that tout promises of securing users’ data and privacy and creating a safe platform for its young users.
TikTok has been dogged by claims that its Chinese ownership means user data could end up in the hands of the Chinese government or that it could be used to promote narratives favorable to the country’s Communist leaders.
In a rare, bipartisan effort to reign in the power and influence of a major social media platform, Republican and Democratic lawmakers pressed Chew on a host of topics, ranging from TikTok’s content moderation practices, how the company plans to secure American data from Beijing, and that it admits spying on journalists.
Watch the Hearing Below:
In 2019, the Guardian had reported TikTok was instructing its moderators to censor videos that mention Tiananmen Square and other images unfavorable to the Chinese government. The platform says it has since changed its moderation practices.
ByteDance admitted in December that it fired four employees last summer who accessed data on two journalists, as well as other people connected to them, while attempting to track down the source of a leaked report about the company.
For its part, TikTok has been trying to distance itself from its Chinese origins, saying that 60% percent of its parent company ByteDance is owned by global institutional investors such as Carlyle Group. ByteDance was founded by Chinese entrepreneurs in Beijing in 2012. Responding to a Wall Street Journal report, China said it would oppose any U.S. attempts to force ByteDance to sell the app.
But Chew pushed back against the idea that TikTok’s ownership was an issue in itself.
“Trust is about actions we take. We have to earn that trust with decisions we make for our company and our products and potential security, privacy content, manipulation concerns raised about TikTok are really not unique to us” Chew said. “Ownership is not at the core of addressing these concerns.”
A U.S. ban on an app would be unprecedented and it’s unclear how the government would enforce it.
Experts say officials could try to force Apple and Google to remove TikTok from their app stores, preventing new users from downloading it as well as preventing existing users from updating it, ultimately rendering it useless.
The U.S. could also block access to TikTok’s infrastructure and data, seize its domain names or force internet service providers like Comcast and Verizon to filter TikTok data traffic, said Ahmed Ghappour, a criminal law and computer security expert who teachers at Boston University School of Law.
But a tech savvy user could still get around restrictions by using a virtual private network to make it appear the user is in another country where it’s not blocked, he said.
To avoid a ban, TikTok has been trying to sell officials on a $1.5 billion plan called Project Texas, which routes all U.S. user data to domestic servers owned and maintained by software giant Oracle. Under the project, access to U.S. data is managed by U.S. employees through a separate entity called TikTok U.S. Data Security, which employs 1,500 people, is run independently of ByteDance and would be monitored by outside observers.
As of October, all new U.S. user data was being stored inside the country. The company started deleting all historic U.S. user data from non-Oracle servers this month, in a process expected to be completed later this year, Chew said.
Generally, researchers have said TikTok behaves like other social media companies when it comes to data collection. In an analysis released in 2021, the University of Toronto’s nonprofit Citizen Lab found TikTok and Facebook collect similar amounts of user data valuable for advertisers.
To block such tracking, Congress, the White House, U.S. armed forces and more than half of U.S. states have banned the use of the app from official devices.
But wiping away all the data tracking associated with the platform might prove to be difficult. In a report released this month, the Cybersecurity company Feroot said so-called tracking pixels from ByteDance, which collect user information, were found on 30 U.S state websites, including some where the app has been banned for official use.
Other countries including Denmark, Canada, Great Britain and New Zealand, along with the European Union, have already banned TikTok from devices issued to government employees.
David Kennedy, a former government intelligence officer who runs the cybersecurity company TrustedSec, agrees with restricting TikTok access on government-issued phones because they might contain sensitive information. A nationwide ban, however, might be too extreme, he said. He also wondered where it might lead.
“We have Tesla in China, we have Microsoft in China, we have Apple in China. Are they going to start banning us now?” Kennedy said. “It could escalate very quickly.”
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Donald Trump defiantly alerted his legion of supporters last weekend that the Manhattan DA’s investigation will ultimately lead to his arrest today (March 21) and called for protests in his honor. On Twitter, the former president’s name is trending with high-ranking GOP members and conservative pundits making a mad scramble to defend the beleaguered business mogul.
Donald Trump, 76, still holds massive sway among Republican Party voters and many of his supporters in elected positions continue to revere him. The seemingly blind support for Trump by GOP and talking heads suggest that they believe in his chances to win back the White House in 2024 despite the mounting allegations of wrongdoing and general image mismanagement.
Over the weekend, Trump took to his social media platform Truth Social and predicted his Tuesday arrest while using some of the charged wording that eventually got him elected and transformed the political fabric of the country in just one presidential term. If indicted, Trump would be the first former U.S. president to have a criminal case brought against them.
The Manhattan DA’s case is centered on Trump and his handlers paying hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. Previous investigations into Trump’s alleged wrongdoings, including impeachment. conspiring with Russia, and tampering with election results, galvanized his supporters to rally around him at a higher clip than expected.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and other GOP officials believe that the Manhattan DA’s case is politically motivated and is an attempt to bring Trump down to size as he’s reportedly leading in polls according to their side. Trump is seen to be the GOP frontrunner for the presidential nomination alongside Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
On Twitter, we’ve managed to collect opinions from all sides of the debate and we should state that Donald Trump has not been charged as of yet. When details emerge, we’ll be sure to report on the matter.
Check out the reactions below.
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Photo: Shane Bevel / Getty
3. Gotta Move That Goalpost
4. Hard To Make Goals When The Post Keeps Moving
6. Oh, Kevin
TikTok was dismissive Wednesday of reports that the Biden administration was calling for its Chinese owners to sell their stakes in the popular video-sharing app, saying such a move wouldn’t help protect national security.
The company was responding to a report in The Wall Street Journal that said the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., part of the Treasury Department, was threatening a U.S. ban on the app unless its owners, Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd., divested.
“If protecting national security is the objective, divestment doesn’t solve the problem: a change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access,” TikTok spokesperson Maureen Shanahan said. “The best way to address concerns about national security is with the transparent, U.S.-based protection of U.S. user data and systems, with robust third-party monitoring, vetting, and verification, which we are already implementing.”
The Journal report cited anonymous “people familiar with the matter.” The Treasury Department and the White House’s National Security Council declined to comment.
Late last month, the White House gave all federal agencies 30 days to wipe TikTok off all government devices.
The Office of Management and Budget called the guidance a “critical step forward in addressing the risks presented by the app to sensitive government data.” Some agencies, including the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and State, already have restrictions in place. The White House already does not allow TikTok on its devices.
Congress passed the “No TikTok on Government Devices Act” in December as part of a sweeping government funding package. The legislation does allow for TikTok use in certain cases, including for national security, law enforcement and research purposes.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in both the House and Senate have been moving forward with legislation that would give the Biden administration more power to clamp down on TikTok.
Rep. Mike McCaul, the chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, has been a vocal critic of the app, saying the Chinese Communist Party is using it to “manipulate and monitor its users while it gobbles up Americans’ data to be used for their malign activities.”
“Anyone with TikTok downloaded on their device has given the CCP a backdoor to all their personal information. It’s a spy balloon into your phone,” the Texas Republican said.
TikTok remains extremely popular and is used by two-thirds of teens in the U.S. But there is increasing concern that Beijing could obtain control of American user data that the app has obtained.
The company has been dismissive of the ban for federal devices and has noted that it is developing security and data privacy plans as part of the Biden administration’s ongoing national security review.
As George Santos continues to dig himself deeper and deeper into the ongoing scandal about his many (many) lies, viral comedian Randy Rainbow is happy to sit back and watch … and yes, sing a show tune or two.
On Wednesday (March 15), Rainbow released his latest parody song, “Life’s a F–king Fantasy for Santos,” castigating the New York congressman for his repeated lies both on and off the campaign trail. Kicking off the video with a cheery reinvention of “Jolly Holiday” from Disney’s 1964 classic Mary Poppins, Rainbow wastes no time in letting Santos know exactly what he thinks of him. “Ain’t he a sack of BS?/ How’d they elect such a mess?” Rainbow opines in the song’s opening strains. “I think he might be high.”
As the song picks up steam, Rainbow — now dressed in full Julie Andrews drag — begins to rattle off a list of things on Santos’ resumé. The resulting patter mixes in disputed claims the representative has actually made (that he was a “Wall Street tycoon,” for example), other claims that he has attempted to obscure (such as his alleged career as a drag queen in Brazil), and a few funny jokes that the comedian peppered in (calling Santos “the very first woman to land on the moon.”)
Just as things begin to get as chaotic as they can, Rainbow suddenly transitions into new parody of The Seekers’ 1966 hit “Georgy Girl,” taking on the Australian folk-pop group’s groovy look to further humiliate Santos. “Hey there, Georgy girl/ Shut your stupid hole and don’t deflect,” he croons over the mellow production. “Find a little self-respect/ And maybe it’s you they’ll like.”
By the time it’s the final stanza of the song, Rainbow expertly mashes both songs together to get in a series of last digs at the embattled congressman. “His nose keeps growing as the Feds close in,” Rainbow declares. “‘Cause everything’s a fantasy with Santos/ My fantasy’s that Santos goes away!”
Check out Rainbow’s full parody video above.
Conservative politicians have been targeting trans people, drag queens and queer culture left and right in recent weeks, and artists such as Paramore‘s Hayley Williams, Lizzo and Ariana Grande aren’t letting it slide.
The three singers are just a few of the many musicians speaking out against a recent surge in anti-LGBTQ bills surging through Republican-led legislatures, particularly in Tennessee. In early March, for example, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed controversial laws banning minors from receiving gender-affirming care and preventing drag queens from performing in certain public spaces.
Why is this dangerous? RuPaul said it best in a March 8 Instagram video about the situation: Other than the life-threatening consequences of persecuting people based on sexuality and gender identity, the lawmakers passing such legislation are “distracting us away from the real issues that they were voted into office to focus on — jobs, healthcare, keeping our children safe from harm at their own school.”
Many musicians aren’t just speaking out against the uptick in discriminatory laws — they’re also singing out. Williams, along with Maren Morris, Sheryl Crow, Jason Isbell, Amanda Shires and several others, are gathering on March 20 in Nashville to stage Love Rising, a benefit concert supporting Tennessee-based LGBTQ organizations.
Even the Music Business Association, which is based in Tennessee, has issued a statement condemning the state’s legislation. “These bigoted actions are especially concerning as we believe the intentional use of vague, inflammatory language will act as a gateway to encouraging acts of violence against the LGBTQ+ community,” it read.
“The music industry is built upon the work of artists, many of whom identify as trans, non-binary, genderqueer, and LGBTQ+,” it continued. “Legislation like this threatens the safety of artists and others, and will force businesses to reconsider holding events in this state. The safety of our conference attendees is central to our Association and will be of paramount concern in planning future events under the Music Biz banner.”
Keep reading to see some of the biggest musicians who are making their voices heard.
Hayley Williams
“Once again our state has passed two regressive and unfathomably harmful bills,” Williams wrote on her Instagram Story in late February, after the Tennessee House passed legislation that would ban drag performances and gender-affirming care. “We stand in solidarity with our LGBTQIA+ family and local LGBTQIA+ orgs in this fight, not only for inclusion for our friends and family in the queer community, but for radical acceptance and empowerment for each of them.”
“Drag is not a crime,” the Tennessee native added ahead of the governor signing the bills into law. “Gender-affirming healthcare for all, including our youth, is a necessity.”
Cyndi Lauper
“I believe you don’t stop the fight,” noted LGBTQ ally Cyndi Lauper said of the Tennessee bills in a March interview, which was captured on video. “Equality for everybody, or nobody’s really equal. This is how Hitler started … just weeding everybody out.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea what they’re doing but, you know, you just have to keep fighting for civil rights,” she continued. “I guess that’s the way it is in this country. Started out like that, didn’t it?”
The B-52s
The B-52s shared a lengthy, passionate statement on Twitter March 8 to “strongly denounce” bills promoting transphobia. “These bills not only violate the fundamental human rights of the affected individuals but also perpetuate a toxic culture of hate and intolerance that has no place in our society,” wrote bandmates Kate Pierson, Fred Schneider and Cindy Wilson.
Lizzo
Lizzo took the discourse surrounding transphobia one step further by explaining how it intersects with racism and fatphobia on Twitter a few days after Gov. Lee signed the restrictive bills.
“I’ve never heard a person say why they’re racist… Or fatphobic.. I’ve never heard a reason why someone is transphobic..,” the “About Damn Time” singer wrote. “I think if we knew ‘why’ these people felt this way there would way less support for these ideals. Because the ‘why’ is more insidious than we realize.”
Jason Isbell
In the Love Rising lineup announcement, Isbell expressed his support more clearly. “Senate Bill 3 and House Bill 9 are clearly targeted attacks on Tennesseans who haven’t done anything wrong,” the former Drive-By Truckers musician said in the press release. “These bills add up to an attempt to eradicate a valuable part of our community and force good people to live in fear. We can’t in good conscience just stand by and let that happen.”
Isbell also tweeted in disagreement of the drag ban specifically, calling it a “completely unnecessary law aimed at people who don’t tend to vote GOP.”
Joy Oladokun
Joy Oladokun, another Love Rising performer, denounced Tennessee’s new laws on Twitter. “For a while now spineless representatives of a hateful minority have been stripping away the rights and care of LGBTQIA+ people in the state,” the “Someone Like You” musician wrote on March 7.
Maren Morris
As one of country music’s most outspoken social activists, Maren Morris signed on to perform at Love Rising and challenged her followers to “show these politicians that they do not speak for all of Tennessee.” “Love will prevail,” the “Circles Around This Town” artist added.
Ariana Grande
Ariana Grande shared a post slamming Tennessee’s drag show ban with her 360 million followers on Instagram Stories. “Tennessee just banned Drag Shows,” the post read. “However Nazi’s [sic] and the KKK can still hold protests and meetings there. Take a long moment and let that sink in very deeply.”
The “Positions” pop star’s brother, reality star Frankie Grande, also didn’t hold back about his feelings regarding the ban. Posting a nine-part Twitter thread on the ban’s potentially dangerous consequences, he wrote, “This is political theatre designed to encourage vigilante violence against a group of people that’s already incredibly vulnerable.”
Thread: The Tennessee Drag Ban (1/9)This bill is not just a one off from a rogue legislator. This is a continuation of a concerted effort by Republicans to criminalize, harass, and endanger LGBTQ+ people. More than 300 anti-LGBTQ+ bills were either introduced or passed in 2022 pic.twitter.com/j8m67BKAAS— Frankie James Grande (@FrankieJGrande) March 6, 2023https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
RuPaul
The Queen of Drag got right down to business in a March 8 Instagram video outlining the urgency of the situation in Tennessee. “Bullies are incompetent at solving real issues,” Ru said. “They look for easy targets so they can give the impression of being effective. They think our love, our light, our laughter and our joy are signs of weakness. But they’re wrong — because that is our strength.”
Calling drag queens “the Marines of the queer movement,” the Drag Race creator added, “Register to vote so we can get these stunt queens out of office and put some smart people with real solutions into government. And by the way — a social media post has never been as powerful as a registered vote.”
As Waymond Wang famously says in Everything Everywhere All At Once, “Please, be kind. Especially when we don’t know what’s going on.”
Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (aka “The Daniels”) certainly took that advice from their character when they accepted the award for best directing at the 2023 Oscars on Sunday (March 12). Dedicating the award to “all the mommies of the world,” Scheinert especially thanked his parents for supporting his passion throughout his life. “Thank you for not squashing my creativity when I was making really disturbing horror films, or really perverted comedy films, or dressing in drag as a kid, which is a threat to nobody.”
That final comment seemed to come as a shot at Tennessee lawmakers, who earlier this month passed a law banning drag performances from taking place on public property, claiming drag posed a threat to children. While Tennessee became the first state to enact such a ban, a number of other states — including North Dakota, Texas, West Virigina, Nebraska and South Carolina — are currently advancing similar legislation.
The Daniels were the big winners at Sunday night’s telecast, as Everything Everywhere All At Once took home a whopping seven awards out of the 11 it was nominated for, including best picture, best direction, best original screenplay, best film editing, and three of the four major acting awards (best actress for Michele Yeoh, best supporting actor for Ke Huy Quan and best supporting actress for Jamie Lee Curtis).
Check out the Daniels’ full speech following their best directing win at the 2023 Oscars above.
Led by CEO Jimmy Humilde, indie label Rancho Humilde executives traveled to Washington, D.C., on March 1 to meet with U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.).
Joined by the label’s co-founding partners José Becerra and Roque Venegas, the meeting, requested by Humilde, focused on discussing key issues that affect the Latin community in the U.S., such as a path to citizenship for the millions of undocumented immigrants living in the country. The last time the U.S. immigration system was meaningfully reformed was in 1986, when then President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act.
Additionally, Humilde expressed his “desire for U.S. consulates and embassies to create panel discussions and educational programs that enable the discovery of hidden talents that can be developed in the U.S. market,” according to a press release. The label executives also met at the White House with President Joe Biden’s senior advisory team to “assess possible ways for the Latin community to participate more in important voting processes at the national level.”
While the discussions in Washington have yet to lead to any sort of reform or the introduction of any new policies, Humilde and his L.A.-based team have been active on a local level. Most recently, Rancho Humilde and its artist Fuerza Regida made a joint donation of $20,000 to the organization Inclusive Action for the City, whose work is promoting the legalization of street vending.
“Street vending should be recognized in the city as an honest trade,” Humilde said in a statement. “It is not only a source of job creation, but it’s also a sector that boosts consumption in the city. I understand their hardships and concern, because at one point it was there where I found my living and that of my family.”
In February, Humilde hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Latin Producers chart (dated Feb. 4) for the first time, thanks to nine production credits on the Hot Latin Songs survey. Rancho Humilde, whose roster includes artists such asIvonne Galáz, Junior H and Fuerza Regida, finished at No. 4 on Billboard’s 2022 year-end Hot Latin Songs Labels recap.
There’s a reason drag performers call RuPaul “mother” — if you mess with her kids, she’s going to come right back at you.
In a video posted to his Instagram on Wednesday (March 8), RuPaul called Tennessee’s new law banning drag artists from performing in public a “distraction technique” being employed by Republican lawmakers. “[It’s] distracting us away from the real issues that they were voted into office to focus on — jobs, healthcare, keeping our children safe from harm at their own school,” he said.
The new law, signed by Gov. Bill Lee on March 3, prohibits “adult cabaret” performances from taking place “on public property or in a location where the adult cabaret performance could be viewed by a person who is not an adult.” The legislation defines these displays as any performance that “features topless dancers, go-go dancers, exotic dancers, strippers, male or female impersonators who provide entertainment that appeals to a prurient interest, or similar entertainers, regardless of whether or not performed for consideration.”
Critics of the legislation have called this statue a violation of the performers’ First Amendment rights, claiming the law is an unwarranted attack on LGBTQ performers who pose no threat to children. The Tennessee chapter of the ACLU added that government officials could “easily abuse this law to censor people based on their own subjective viewpoints of what they deem appropriate.”
In his video, RuPaul called out the governor and legislators responsible for pushing this bill through. “Bullies are incompetent at solving real issues,” he said. They look for easy targets so they can give the impression of being effective. They think our love, our light, our laughter and our joy are signs of weakness. But they’re wrong — because that is our strength.”
Calling drag queens “the Marines of the queer movement,” Ru urged viewers to take action rather than watching what happens next. “Register to vote so we can get these stunt queens out of office and put some smart people with real solutions into government,” he said. “And by the way — a social media post has never been as powerful as a registered vote.”
Check out RuPaul’s full video statement below:
Lizzo has some thoughts. In a series of tweets Wednesday morning (March 8), the musician opened up a conversation about how issues such as transphobia, racism and fatphobia intersect.
“Transphobia is lookin real rooted in racism right about now…,” she began in a tweet before following it up with another. “I’ve never heard a person say why they’re racist… Or fatphobic.. I’ve never heard a reason why someone is transphobic.. I think if we knew ‘why’ these people felt this way there would way less support for these ideals. Because the ‘why’ is more insidious than we realize.”
Later, the “About Damn Time” singer posted a clarification. “Don’t get it twisted— I don’t care why people are bigoted,” she wrote. “That’s a waste of my imagination. I feel like there’s a lot of complicit silence and apathetic participation going on that wouldn’t fly if people knew more.”
Some of her followers were quick to join in on the discourse she started, with one fan agreeing that “forcing people to admit specifics as to why they hold awful positions helps others see how horrid it is.”
“A friend of mine always says ‘hate is hate,’” another fan replied. “It’s all intertwined and one always connects to the other no matter what they try to tell us.”
The Yitty founder has long been an activist for social justice and inclusivity, and maintains her support for causes such as abortion access, LGBTQ rights and anti-racism through her website, Lizzo Loves You.
Just three days prior to her latest tweets, she posted her thoughts on the return of the once famous Victoria’s Secret fashion show, which hasn’t aired in four years since the brand canceled its 2019 show amid increasing criticism of its historic lack of diversity and inclusivity.
“This is a win for inclusivity for inclusivity’s sake,” she tweeted Sunday (March 5), re-sharing a video teaser for the show that showcased several plus-size women of color. “But if brands start doing this only because they’ve received backlash then what happens when the ‘trends’ change again? Do the CEOs of these companies value true inclusivity? Or do they just value money?”
See Lizzo’s recent tweets about intersectionality and inclusivity below:
Transphobia is lookin real rooted in racism right about now…— FOLLOW @YITTY (@lizzo) March 8, 2023
Don’t get it twisted— I don’t care why people are bigoted. That’s a waste of my imagination.I feel like there’s a lot of complicit silence and apathetic participation going on that wouldn’t fly if people knew more. https://t.co/CxcLi86qnL— FOLLOW @YITTY (@lizzo) March 8, 2023
This is a win for inclusivity for inclusivity’s sakeBut if brands start doing this only because they’ve received backlash then what happens when the ‘trends’ change again?Do the CEOs of these companies value true inclusivity? Or do they just value money? https://t.co/ykmcUTLayQ— FOLLOW @YITTY (@lizzo) March 5, 2023