Olivia Jade Giannulli
In the context of ongoing protests filling the streets of American cities, Giannulli—who goes by Olivia Jade—must have felt she has some responsibility to add her voice to the conversation. Here's the thing though: She doesn't.
While nothing she said was necessarily wrong—it's true that "not being racist isn't enough" and that white people need to be active in the fight against racism—her comments quickly invited criticism from people who noted the strangeness of this message coming from someone who so recently came to prominence as a symbol of privilege. Jade, along with her parents, became central to the 2019 college admission scandal known as Operation Varsity Blues when it was revealed that they had paid $500,000 in bribes and fabricated a fraudulent athletic record in order to get her into USC.
On top of the immense privilege that the whole situation points to—with Jade potentially taking an admission spot from someone far more deserving and less fortunate—others noted that her parents (who recently pled guilty to conspiracy charges after more than a year of fighting for the charges to be dismissed) were expecting relatively light sentences–likely due to the white privilege which Jade calls on people to "use" in the fight for racial justice. Clearly she and her family know a thing or two about using white privilege.
Of course, in this situation, it can be hard to know what to say, and it's clear that Jade's heart was in the right place. She was trying her best to be a sensitive and thoughtful ally for the protesters. Unfortunately, she may just not be cut out for that role, and for people like her, there is another option: Just shut up.
In recent days there have been a number of stories about people failing to take this route. Glee's Lea Michele was called out on Twitter by Samantha Ware and several other black Glee cast members who found her message of support for the Black Lives Matter movement at odds with her past cruelty. Most stunning of all was French DJ David Guetta's new EDM track dedicated to the memory of George Floyd, featuring a portion of Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech." Along with inducing levels of cringe that scientists believed to be impossible, the song raises an important question, namely: Who asked for this?
The answer (obviously) is no one. While it's genuinely great that Guetta wanted to live stream a rooftop concert to raise money for coronavirus relief, no one needed or wanted that event to include a "shout out" to George Floyd's family, and the image of a 52-year-old white man dancing to a beat that he has for some reason combined with what is already the most abused and misappropriated speech of all time is simply breathtaking. Would some other tribute have been more well-received? Maybe (it's hard to imagine one being worse), but it was a minefield that Guetta chose to navigate at literally no one's behest. Instead of that, he could have said... nothing.
Not just about this topic, but about everything. If you want to help and you're not sure how then you can just stop talking for a little while. Make some room for people who are more equipped to handle these complex and serious topics by taking a couple days—or a couple weeks—away from sharing every thought on social media. That was supposed to be the point of the #BlackoutTuesday hashtag, but the fact that it instead ended up co-opting the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag and burying important information is indicative of the problem.
Olivia, you can use your platform to signal boost black voices without the clumsy commentary—it's the equivalent of lip-syncing along to "Happy Birthday" when you know that you can't sing (though in your case you're only figuratively tone deaf). For instance, if you'd just shared that chart differentiating covert and overt white supremacy with your little note to "read this and keep educating urself," you would have been fine. And David, you can still raise money for the coronavirus, but if you want to touch on the protest movement, just give up a portion of your live stream concert for someone more qualified to make a statement. in other words: Shut up and listen.
It's actually easy! You might be doing it right now, without even meaning to! Just notice how there are massive, historic events taking place and realize that you will survive people paying attention to something other than you. As a fellow white person online, I get it—it's tough feeling left out—but you can actually still play a part in history without trying to make it about yourself: You can join the protests (where you really can use your white privilege to help shield activists from racist violence), contact your legislators about policies that can help, donate to bail funds, and point your friends and followers to educational sources that have a stronger foundation to speak from.
If you need to say something, you can always try focusing a little more on self-criticism, rather than trying to direct others on how to be as enlightened as you. And, as always, if you feel like you're out of your depth (you do feel that, right?) and you're worried about the backlash you'll face if you get things wrong, you can just choose to keep your mouth shut.
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