leave Julia Fox (and literally every other woman) alone!!
thoughts Julia Fox // how the internet is riddled with misogynists in feminists' clothing
The drama: people were mad at Julia Fox for having dated Kanye; now, they’re mocking her explanation as to why.
Julia Fox, the internet’s favorite maverick celebrity, is once again making headlines after she posted a (now deleted) TikTok responding to a comment she received on another video, which reads, “I just wish you weren’t dating a famously violent misogynist and antisemite.”
In case you recently suffered from some sort of head trauma that resulted in the tragic erasure of your knowledge of the most important moments in recent pop culture: the commenter is referring to Julia’s infamous and highly publicized month-long romance with Ye (aka Kanye West).
Julia’s video is basically an explanation (or justification) for why she dated—and broke up with—Ye. In the two and half minute video, she describes her thoughts (and subsequent actions) during the four-six weeks that she and Ye were involved. You can find the full transcript from the video in the comments below, but in brief, her story goes as follows:
The beginning:
She began with, “first of all, he was being normal around me.” And went on to explain that, at the time he first pursued her and throughout the duration of their whirlwind romance, Ye wasn’t on social media and had not yet begun his obsessive and very public pursuit of his ex-wife, Kim Kardashian.
She loves Kim (and Khloe and Kourtney), because Kim stocked Julia’s designs in her store ~10 years ago, when Julia had a clothing company, Franziska Fox.
She initially ignored Ye’s advances, but “he kept going and going,” and actually instead prompted him to scold her for “bad texting etiquette.” She remembers thinking, “oh my god, Kanye’s yelling at me. What do I do?”
Then, she says, she had a thought, “oh my god, maybe I can get him off of Kim’s case. Maybe I can distract him, just get him to like me, and I knew, if anyone can do it, it’s me.”
The middle:
They didn’t talk about his relationship with Kim, and she actually liked Ye/found an intellectual and creative camaraderie with him, “We only really talked about clothes and weird ideas and plans for the future and our hopes and dreams for childhood and education. And it was really beautiful, guys.”
The end:
Once Kanye started Tweeting, she, “was like, I’m not gonna stick around for this shit.”
After a brief moment of “delusional” thinking, during which she fell into the “I want to help him” trap (relatable queen), she “was out.”
The media continued to report on their relationship for about one more week, which made it seem like she was still dating him after he began publicly attacking Kim.
She still respects Kanye as an artist.
She condemns his antisemetic beliefs, “I stand with the Jewish community. Period.”
Unsurprisingly, the internet and the media are having a field day with Julia’s assertion that she dated Kanye to get him off Kim’s case. Unsurprising, not because this was the most note-worthy aspect of this whole internet drama, but because history has proven that, if a female celebrity says something that seems remotely disingenuous or unrealistic, everyone will jump on the opportunity to tear her apart by hyper-fixating on that thing in order to discount her validity and, ideally, publicly shame/embarrass her. I mean, what is a female celebrity if not a free-for-all punching bag??
Now, I won’t pretend that my eyebrows didn’t fight my botox in an attempt to raise when Julia cited wanting to relieve Kim of Kanye as one the key reason she changed her mind and decided to entertain Ye’s advances, but I didn’t think that was the most interesting or problematic aspect of her explanation. It’s an easy claim to make fun of/attack the already divisive celeb for making, though, so it’s all that’s being talked about.
What we should be talking about is the misogyny behind the initial comment (and the hordes of comments like it that Julia’s been receiving since Kanye’s most recent tirade, which included some terrifying antisemitic remarks, and his subsequent fall from grace), the constant scrutiny opinionated women are subjected to, and the pressure that women feel to excuse and explain their choices in order to maintain their right to respect.
Of course, when we live in a world that hates women, it’s to be expected that the discourse around this “controversy” is itself perpetuating that hatred, rather than examining it. So, since no one else (except for Julia Fox) seems to be talking about it… let’s talk about it.
The real drama: the comment, its context, and the misdirected condemnation of Julia Fox.
Let’s go back to the comment that Julia first replied to, “I just wish you weren’t dating a famously violent misogynist and antisemite.”
For some context, the comment was left on another of Julia’s TikToks, which was regarding an apology video by TikToker Bela Delgado. Delgado, now retired, recently came under fire after attacking Julia Fox in a misogynistic (now deleted) viral rant, which included the following statements:
“You were proudly banging Kanye West, a once very vocal Donald Trump supporter, while he was simultaneously running an extremely aggressive harassment campaign against his ex-wife…”
“You sold out every last one of your feminist morals when you decided to play dress up with Kim Kardashian’s sloppy seconds.”
“You mean to tell me you were willing to get your pork chop penetrated by a 45-year-old man who once actually called a woman a bitch as a slur.”
The rant, ironically, was prompted by a comment that Julia left on another of Bela’s videos, addressing the controversy their song “Annoying Ass Bitch” caused for its use of a “misogynistic slur.” It’s certainly an interesting tactic to refer to a woman’s body as meat in order to prove you’re entitled to use “bitch” ironically because you’re actually not misogynistic…
While Delgado received enough comments holding them accountable for the nasty shit he said to/about Fox to issue an apology and get off TikTok, the video’s comment section was shockingly divided. They also received a lot of applause from commenters who seemed to think the rant was valid and were thrilled to see Fox be “called out” for having dated the infamously problematic Kanye West. It seems that the commenter was one of these supporters, and was trying to echo the sentiment behind Delgado’s disturbing rant.
Their point, I gather, is this: if you’ve dated a misogynist, you’ve somehow co-signed on misogyny (or “sold out… your feminist morals”) and therefore aren’t allowed to call out misogyny when you see it ever again? The logic doesn’t quite track.
First of all, who hasn’t dated a misogynist? Julia spoke to this herself in a subsequent video (also now deleted), saying, “If women really didn’t date men that upheld patriarchal values, or didn’t date men that were misogynistic, or had problems with abuse, or said problematic things in the past, there would be no men left to date.” Period. She added, “don’t get mad at me for doing what men trained me to do, which is to overlook the bad stuff and focus on the good.” To that, all I can say is: deadass.
Sometimes, we overlook misogyny because we’ve been conditioned to, as Julia suggested she did when she dated Kanye. I would add that, actually, we’re often attracted to misogyny… because we’ve been conditioned to be. Recognizing and avoiding misogynistic men 100% of the time is impossible, because we’ve been raised not to. A woman’s attraction to or involvement with misogynists isn’t an indicator of her morality–it’s a byproduct of the patriarchal society we’ve all been shaped by.
Even if there were throngs of unproblematic kings to choose from, which there aren’t, the idea that a woman is no longer valid if she dates a (known) misogynist is just ludacris and illogical. It’s giving: condemning someone as guilty by association, but make it the perpetuation of our collective hatred of women.
Why do we punish women and question their “morality” or right to be feminists by citing moments in the past when they’ve participated in or benefited from patriarchy? It’s giving: expecting disproportionately more from women than we do from men and punishing women for the behaviors we reward men for.
Lastly, isn’t the hope that, when you date someone with any type of harmful issue (be it a misogynist or an addict), you learn from the experience (like how to spot the signs, or specifically how and why the issue is so harmful, or how and when you really need to get out) and actually grown from that new found knowledge so you can choose healthier partner in the future? Isn’t that kind of a HUGE ASPECT of dating/being young? Like??? And, honestly, the women who have gone through this cycle and become outspoken feminists as a result are exactly the ones who should be talking about it.
I'm not suggesting that anyone who hasn’t already should go and date a problematic loser to earn the experience needed to dismantle the patriarchy. Every non-male has been on the receiving end of misogyny countless times just by existing. All I’m saying is, while we may generally reserve the title of “expert” to academics, we might want to extend that title to women who’ve experienced, recognized, and learned from situations/relationships with misogynists.
Bottom line: the comments condemning Julia for her connection to Kanye is just another disappointing yet expected symptom of the real issue behind this entire controversy: deep-seated misogyny.
It’s inherently misogynistic to try to discount a woman’s legitimacy/right to speak about misogyny by reducing her to the sins of her ex-fling (which is the case here, but the same holds true if it were her current husband, even). If Julia can’t call out misogyny because she dated a misogynist, why can this commenter call it out when they're being misogynistic? It’s kind of one big, virtue-signaling misogynistic circle-jerk, huh?
The real issue: the public’s desire to destroy, devalue, and demote women–especially outspoken ones.
The problem (for the og commenter and their like-minded peers) has never been that Julia dated Kanye. The problem also isn’t that one of her justifications for doing so seems like a convenient reach. The problem is that, under the guise of accountability, people are grasping at ways to prove that Julia Fox is a bad/complacent woman in order to justify their distain for her (or women in general). They may even want to delegitimize the feminist ideals she talks about (or to delegitimize feminism in general). At bare minimum, they want to paint her as being hypocritical or ridiculous, so they can make her the butt of their jokes (because, of course, women can’t be funny unless you’re laughing at them).
Now, I should mention that the reason I’m so bothered by this isn’t just that people are attacking Julia Fox, though I don’t love that it is/I do love Julia. I’m bothered because this isn’t just an isolated incident, it’s a pervasive trend. People either don’t get how they’re participating in and perpetuating the very thing they’re “calling out,” or they’re intentionally subverting “call out culture” in order to further their misogynistic agendas. It’s silencing 101, meaning that, while it’s disappointing, it’s not surprising.
From the trial and execution of Anne of Boylen–who was beheaded for unproven accusations of adultery so that Henry XIIIth would be free to marry one of his mistresses–to the highly televised Depp-Heard defamation case–during which Amber Heard was relentlessly mocked as her character was dissected and decimated until she was found guilty and charged millions in reparations to Depp–to the discourse around and response to Summer Stroh–who posted a video confessing to having an affair with Adam Levine, and was dragged in countless videos/articles as being an attention-seeking home wrecker who single handedly destroyed Levine’s wife’s life–our society that has been putting women on trial (literally or figuratively) for the crimes of men they are associated with for centuries.
We send girls home from school if they’re wearing something that might “distract the boys.” We ask survivors of rape if they were drunk or suggest their outfits implied they “were asking for it”. We overturn Roe v. Wade, and force women to bear the consequences of an unwanted pregnancy. In some states, we even charge women more harshly for having an abortion after being impregnated by rape than we would charge her rapist for raping her, in the slim chance he were to be convicted.
I could go on and on, but this piece is getting really long, so I’ll wrap it up (another thing a man will refuse to do then blame the woman for! smdh…).
My final bottom line: There are innumerable examples of ways in which people–as individuals and as a collective–will take the first opportunity they get to bring a woman down for a man’s problems. It’s disturbing, scary, and sad. I’m over it. I wish that people on the internet/journalists would grow up and stop pretending to be holier than whatever female celebrities becomes vulnerable to an easily sensationalized media smear campaign, and start using their brains to come up with something that resembles an interesting take.
As far as my thoughts on Julia Fox?
She’s interesting, unfiltered, and smart. She’s thought-provoking and entertaining. She’s funny and also can laugh at herself. She’s a PR genius who really knows how to work both fans and haters alike. She’s divisive, and I don’t agree with all her takes or decisions, but I’m so bored of the age of hyper-curated, media trained, flawless celebrities that I’m genuinely grateful for her for paving the way for a more interesting celebrity type to exist.
I don’t know whether she exaggerated the significance of female camaraderie in her decision to date Ye, but if anyone could be motivated by that, it’s Julia Fox. I love her.
Interested in hearing your thoughts on any/all of the above. Please drop em below!
xoxo
P.S. I was about to post this when I noticed that, sometime in the past 24 hours, Julia Fox deleted the two videos that have been so widely mocked and scrutinized. I don’t know if this is because she’s since changed her mind about some of the things she said, or because she got tired of getting notifications about the vitriolic response they received, but I was surprised to discover this and just want to note it.