Everything That Upset the Internet This Week

What is the web-o-sphere angry about this week? From Mario Lopez speaking out against parents who support their transgender kids to Jessica Simpson getting mom-shamed, here’s everything you need to know.

Mario Lopez says it’s “dangerous” for parents to support their transgender children

THE STORY: In a radio interview with conservative commentator Candace Owens, Lopez expressed concern over what he called an “alarming” trend of parents supporting their transgender and gender-nonconforming children, which he believes could lead to harmful “repercussions” down the road. “My God if you’re three years old and you’re saying you feel a certain way or you think you’re a boy or a girl or whatever the case may be, I just think it’s dangerous for a parent to make that determination, OK, you’re going to be a boy or a girl, whatever the case may be.”

THE REACTION:

RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE RAGE: For some reason Owens and Lopez seem to think that creating a safe space for your child to articulate his or her feelings about their gender identity is tantamount to wheeling them in for gender-reassignment surgery. As the American Academy of Pediatrics notes, “taking a ‘gender-affirming,’ nonjudgmental approach helps children feel safe in a society that too often marginalizes or stigmatizes those seen as different.” The two also don’t seem to understand the difference between gender identity and sexuality. “When you’re a kid … You don’t know anything about sexuality, you’re just a kid,” Lopez said, failing to grasp that how you identify on the gender spectrum has nothing to do with who you may one day be attracted to. Lopez later apologized but is now being dragged by conservatives for the apology.

A transphobic model claims to be trans to avoid backlash

THE STORY: Model Carissa Pinkston, who has worked with Savage X Fenty and Prabal Gurung, recently posted a series of transphobic comments on Facebook under a pseudonym. In one, she wrote, “Being Transgender does NOT make you a Woman. It makes you simply Transgender.” When her comments were shared on Twitter and began to garner outrage, she issued a bizarre statement claiming that she herself was transgender, which many people, including her friends, have said is a lie. She has since apologized: “I apologize for any transphobic remark I’ve ever made towards the Trans community. I panicked and thought that if I came out as Trans that I could somehow make things better for myself, but it appears I’ve only made things worse.”

THE REACTION:

RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE RAGE: The entire situation is a debacle from start to finish: the initial comments, the attempt to “come out” as trans to deflect the backlash and then her apology. She later posted photos of herself and transgender model Hunter Schafer on her Instagram Stories, saying, “I hate to do this because this doesn’t concern her but, me being ‘Transphobic’ is stupid. I been friends with Hunter way before all these comments and now she won’t even talk to me.” This is equivalent to claiming you can’t be a racist because you have one friend who’s a person of colour, and well, no one has the patience for that kind of feeble Hail Mary.

Jessica Simpson gets mom-shamed

THE STORY: Jessica Simpson shared a photo on Instagram of her 7-year-old daughter sporting a new dip-dyed hairdo, inspired by a character from the Disney Channel film Descendants. She immediately began receiving backlash from followers for letting her daughter dye her hair at such a young age and though she chose not to comment or engage with the situation, fellow pop star Pink spoke up on her behalf. “I heard people were bummed on Jessica Simpson for letting her seven year old get her hair coloured. So we thought we’d share what we did yesterday,” she posted, along with a picture of herself dyeing her 8-year-old daughter’s hair blue.

THE REACTION:

Simpson’s Instagram post received a slew of negative comments, including “Isn’t she too young to have her hair dyed?” and “So young it’s a shame.” Another user commented saying, “Not sure about this?” while another was even more direct: “What [are you] doing[?] She is so young now out there for all the wrong reasons ?☹️?☹️.”

RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE RAGE: The internet has created a place where people feel they have the license to weigh in and judge the choices of complete strangers from afar. Even totally harmless choices, that affect absolutely no one, and involve just a bit of hair dye. But whether you agree with how someone is parenting or not isn’t even the point—what are you going to achieve by commenting on it, especially in a hurtful way? Criticism, even if it’s constructive, doesn’t mean much coming from a stranger thousands of miles away. If your aim is to get Simpson to change her mind about dyeing her daughter’s hair, I hate to break it to you—it won’t be because of a bunch of hateful Instagram comments.

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