Lizzo Defended Her ‘Feminist’ Stage Leotards, and She’s Got a Point

It’s a cliché, at this point, to say anyone is living their best life, but Lizzo really is! Riding the high of her second studio album and with a new shapewear line on the market, the actor-singer-dancer-flautist (oh, and Emmy winner!) is thriving, and no amount of negativity can bring her down. In particular, she’s completely embraced her body, and she knows exactly why some people have a problem with it: sexism, racism, fatphobia.

“I saw a tweet, ‘Say what you want about Lizzo,’ and I was like, what are people saying?” she told Vanity Fair in a wide-ranging new profile. “I saw a picture of me laughing and someone said she seems to have a lot of fun with her fans. Yeah, I do have fun, because if I’m not having fun right now, when am I going to be able to enjoy having a hot, rockin’ bod, being young, beautiful, and rich?” 

The 34-year-old also takes on criticism of her body and the revealing outfits she wears onstage. “Black women are hypersexualized all the time, and masculinized simultaneously. Because of the structure of racism, if you’re thinner and lighter, or your features are narrow, you’re closer to being a woman,” she says, pointing out the dance leotards are at this point the industry standard for pop stars. “I wanted to be like a dancer, and also it was kind of political and feminist in my eyes to have me, a full-figured dancer, wearing leotards, showing and celebrating curves and being Olympian in strength, endurance, and flexibility.”

Owning her body is a right she knows all women deserve, and she takes the opportunity to reiterate her support for reproductive freedom. “I know plenty of people who would have died if they hadn’t had [an abortion],” she says. “It shouldn’t matter what my opinion is. Opinions is what got us in this shit in the first place—what people think people should be doing with their bodies. These days we don’t create laws that support people having health care, never mind abortions. How about letting people have access and resources and mind their fucking business?”

Amen.