Yes, We All Love Beyoncé, but Let’s Talk About Online Bullying for a Sec
Just in case you’ve been living in a WiFi-less world this past weekend, you should probably know about a little something that happened on Saturday: Beyoncé’s new album finally dropped. Of course, there are some tracks you can expect to hear on every party playlist this spring + summer, but moreover, both the visual album she released on HBO and the song lyrics she sings throughout make it pretty clear that all those cheating rumors were, in fact, true. It should come as no surprise that Beyoncé’s super loyal fanbase was very upset. The Internet quickly went on a witch hunt for the other woman (AKA “Becky with the good hair”), and it didn’t take long to find her.
Shortly after the album was released, fashion designer Rachel Roy Instagrammed a photo of her and a friend alongside the caption, “Good hair, don’t care but we will take good lighting for selfies or self truth, always, Live in the light #nodramaqueens.” Naturally, people caught on to her not-so-subtle reference to the already famous Beyoncé lyric and swarmed Rachel’s account pretty hard. Rachel has since made her account private, cancelled upcoming events due to a “personal emergency” and posted a statement on Twitter.
I respect love, marriages, families and strength. What shouldn't be tolerated by anyone, no matter what, is bullying, of any kind.
— Rachel Roy (@Rachel_Roy) April 24, 2016
While we’re of course MAJOR Beyoncé fans, Rachel has a very valid point here. As much as we love Beyoncé, that doesn’t mean it’s cool for the Internet to troll Rachel. After she made her Instagram private, the Beyhive even went so far as to move on to the next best thing: her 16-year-old daughter Ava Dash. Throughout Ava’s Instagram you’ll find an endless supply of horrific comments about her mom, and even some hateful things about her.
At this point, it should be pretty obvious that things have gone too far. Even if you’ve been a Beyoncé supporter from day one, it’s safe to say that even the queen herself would hesitate to condone attacking a minor’s account with crude and entirely inappropriate comments. Online bullying is something celebrities deal with on the daily, but this situation has really shed some light on how cruel commenting culture can be.
Yes, these are celebrities. Their lives are public. But here’s the thing: Just because you see snippets of someone’s life on screen doesn’t mean you really know what’s going on the other 90 percent of the time. Bey + Jay Z seem to be trying to work things out, and it’s time we move on with them.
What are your thoughts on the Beyoncé + Rachel Roy situation? Respectfully share with us on Twitter @britandco.
(Photos via Ilya S. Savenok/Getty and @ava_dash)
