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”?
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.
“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.
So that could be bad, or it could be “go on girl, touch em!” and she interpreted refusal to be deleterious to her career without direct evidence.
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”.
That confuses me. It’d make more sense if the dance cast had women of full-figure and not full-figure, and women both of and not of color if only the former of each were being denigrated. But it could also be that the dance cast misbehaved and was scolded in entirety and this is an assumption.
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.
2nd line is about Quigley as well? That sounds weird since Lizzo isn’t exactly a Christian virture bastion and her videos and songs can be quite sex-positive. But even if so, that’s tangentially only a problem with Lizzo for employing her.
These accusations seem oddly non-specific for sexual harassment.
Regarding the nightclub … the easiest way I’ve found to sort my feelings out on this was to imagine how hard I’d cringe if this skit was in my corporate-sponsored sexual harassment training. The answer is something around the level of crawl-in-a-hole-and-die rather than endure this skit, and I’m pretty sure “Director So and So is planning a company party and suggested a strip club. How would you respond?” was an actual scenario in one of the many I’ve had to sit through.
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.
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.
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
“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.
Except I’m not defending anyone, I’m not a Lizzo fan, and I’ve never used the slogan “believe all women” in my life.
In fact someone upthread basically had to explain to me what it means just now.
It’s like the classic SA apologists
Are you really likening me to a sexual abuse apologist because I said I was waiting for more information to make a judgment on allegations about some stranger on the other side of the world?
I know it’s an emotive topic, but yikes, cool your jets.
I hope it isn’t true. I’m not a fan of her music, but I love the positivity she puts out in her performances and her persona, as well as her support of drag culture. I’ll wait to see what comes of these accusations and others.
It’s funny how parasites like you aren’t empathetic towards the victims or mad at her vile behavior. No, instead your go to reaction is to defend her. Disgusting.
Also her “positivity” is good as aids. Promoting obesity, bullying people, and spewing bullshit is not positive.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Pop star Lizzo is being sued by three of her former dancers over claims including sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment.
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.
Though never explicitly stated, the questions “gave Ms Davis the impression that she needed to explain her weight gain and disclose intimate personal details about her life in order to keep her job”, the legal action says.
Additionally, it alleges the dance team’s captain, Shirlene Quigley, pushed her Christian beliefs on performers and derided those who engaged in premarital sex.
They were accused of being “lazy, unprofessional, and having bad attitudes” - the case claimed these are tropes often used “to disparage and discourage” black women and that other dancers were not treated like this.
This really sucks. Important to remember anybody is capable of anything. I dread the ensuing conversations about this.
It’s funny how parasites like you aren’t empathetic towards the victims or mad at her vile behavior. No, instead your go to reaction is to defend her. Disgusting.
