Three former dancers allege the singer contributed to creating a hostile work environment.
Even if Lizzo does turn out to be a hypocritical garbage person, the internet misogynists are going to run wild with this. This time they get to go after her and her accusers.
The conversation around this is going to get real horrible real fast, knowing the internet.
I’m keeping an open mind on this one because some of these allegations is a bit constructive/interpretive:
Ms Davis alleges the two questioned whether she was “struggling with something as she seemed less committed to her role on the dance cast”, the case details.
“In professional dance, a dancer’s weight gain is often seen as that dancer getting lazy or worse off as a performer. Lizzo’s and Ms. Scott’s questions about Ms. Davis’s commitment to the tour were thinly veiled concerns about Ms Davis’s weight gain,” the documents allege.
So what actually happened is she was asked if something was wrong because they thought she was less committed.
Her argument here is that reading between the lines they really meant “you are too fat”.
But what if reading between the lines they actually meant “you keep phoning it in during rehearsals”?
“Believe all women!”
“Believe all victims!”
“…unless the abuser is a person that I like then I must rush to defend them because the victims are lying and we need to see all the evidence”
It’s like the classic SA apologists but repackaged.
Yes, that one could be misinterpretation. But there are also more problematic behaviours listed in the lawsuit:
The legal action, filed in Los Angeles on Tuesday, includes allegations the dancers were “forced to endure sexually denigrating behaviour” and were “pressured into participating in disturbing sex shows” between 2021 and 2023.
Among the claims against Lizzo - whose real name is Melissa Viviane Jefferson - are that she “pressured Ms Davis to touch the breasts” of a performer in a nightclub in Amsterdam, and Ms Davis - after resisting - eventually acquiesced “fearing it may harm her future on the team” if she didn’t do so.
The case also alleges that staff working for BGBT scolded dancers for “unacceptable and disrespectful” behaviour while working on the tour, without specifying what that behaviour was.
The dancers allege that “only the dance cast - comprised of full-figured women of colour - were ever spoken to in this manner, giving [the dancers] the impression that these comments were charged with racial and fat-phobic animus”.
Additionally, it alleges the dance team’s captain, Shirlene Quigley, pushed her Christian beliefs on performers and derided those who engaged in premarital sex.
She is also accused of openly discussing one of the former dancers’ virginity, and posting about it on social media.
True, they do sound more serious, I agree. But the problem with the example I quoted is it makes me wonder what the standard is for these other allegations, in terms of the relationship between what was actually said and what was inferred.
If someone’s the kind of person who assumes having their commitment questioned must be veiled fat shaming, then they might be doing the same kind of leaps with these other things.
For example, being scolded for disrespectful behaviour, might genuinely be because the clique of dancers were the only ones engaging in the behaviour.
It just makes me a little hesitant. Perhaps the suit makes it clearer.
Fat-shaming is so commonplace especially in ballet and dancing in general and this is quite a common way to put it - using the allegory of “motivation” even when they refer to shape, so I would argue that this is a justified way of “reading between the lines”.
People also need to remember that we should believe accusers long enough to find out whether their accusations are accurate. So we should believe it is possible and look for more details instead of dismissing them outright.
So we shouldn’t throw out everything just because a few of them are phrased like sour grapes or remind us of people that infer the wrong things. Let’s wait for more context before vilifying the dancers or Lizzo.
I’m keeping an open mind
HOW DARE YOU, BIGOT!
This isn’t the first time we see you posting in bad faith. You were previously temporarily banned as well. This has been escalated to a perma ban. Good bye.
Hey, I want to start out saying that I thank you and deeply respect you for your work on this platform. I have taken several minutes to explore this persons account on lemmy.ml and they replied that this response was supposed to be sarcastic. That was also my initial interpretation as this reply would not make very much sense literally as bigoted/bad faith people don’t generally (in my limited experience, admins/mods have much more) call open minded people bigoted in direct response to others directly saying they are “keeping an open mind”. I did not go back far enough in their history or didn’t notice what could have caused the temp ban before. I find the person argumentative sure, but not acting in bad faith per-say nor are their stated views in many comments indicative of this. Could you, if you have the time/energy reconsider this ban and/or reply with evidence of this past bad faith that resulted in temp-ban? Thank you
Looking at the modlog:
21 days ago in response to a question thread:
Who cares? source
Gaywallet called it out:
Please help me to understand how this can be interpreted as anything but rude and dismissive source
They never responded. No action was taken.
11 days ago :
Right. Us stupid white people didn’t realize bad words existed! source
I called this out:
Your comment is in bad faith. Take a step back to consider how you interact with people. source
They responded with:
Your comment is racist and makes no fucking sense. Take a moment to construct an actual argument instead of just throwing around some bullshit terminology you read on the Internet. Or don’t reply to me again
Source: modlog (because it was deleted)
This resulted in a 4 day site-wide ban.
Today, well, whatever this is - I see it as rage bait and just generally not a good way to start a conversation. It’s also worth mentioning that the username does not inspire good faith to begin with but that’s fairly minor. Do you still think that this should be reconsidered?
No, thank you. I very much appreciate this transparency and expertise. I just wasn’t sure, based on what I had seen in some 10 minutes of skimming. Thanks again for your noble volunteering!
No problem. I understand wanting to know more and I really appreciate the way you asked without being demanding or assuming bad intent.
This really sucks. Important to remember anybody is capable of anything. I dread the ensuing conversations about this.
Well, that’s genuinely a bummer. Loved Lizzo’s music, personality, and confidence. Here’s hoping this is a wake up call for her and she gives a sincere apology
You don’t know that she’s done anything wrong. These are only accusations. Wait for more details before you change your opinion of a person.
Sorry, the best the internet can do is immediately announce her as guilty.
What is with you people and your hatred for black people?
Why are all of you so racist these days
Hi @Arobanyan, can you explain what you are seeing here that is troubling to you or seems racially motivated? One of the core principles that we try to operate by here at Beehaw is to assume good faith in others. If you have questions about a user’s motivations, ask them (kindly) to clarify rather than assuming bad faith and responding in an accusatory way. We ask that users give other users the benefit of the doubt “unless they are unequivocally advocating for hate or intolerance of fellow humans”, which I’m not seeing in these comments.
