Former Lizzo Dancers Sue the Star for 'Sexual Harassment' and 'Creating a Hostile Work Environment'

I’m sure that some people believe Lizzo has talent beyond a genius for self-promotion. It’s positively brilliant that she was able to turn an obvious handicap — morbid obesity — into a marketing gimmick. Lizzo purports to be a rapper, singer, songwriter, actress, and musician — mediocre talents in all artistic fields, in my opinion.

Beyond that, she’s become the spokesperson/mascot for a movement that’s going to kill a lot of young women. “Body positivity” is fine. Women who worry about gaining a few pounds need to know and believe that they are still attractive.

But women and girls also need to know of the snake oil Lizzo is selling. “Body positivity” cannot be disconnected from women’s health. And the number of conditions and diseases 35-year-old Lizzo will be subject to in the coming years will eventually kill her unless she loses a lot of weight.

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Now Lizzo is involved in a tawdry affair involving some of her former dancers. They have accused the singer of sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment in a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

NBCNews:

The dancers accused Lizzo — a performer known for embracing body positivity and celebrating her physique — of calling attention to one dancer’s weight gain and later berating, then firing, that dancer after she recorded a meeting because of a health condition.

The suit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court and provided to NBC News by the plaintiffs’ law firm, also accuses the captain of Lizzo’s dance team of proselytizing to other performers and deriding those who had premarital sex while sharing lewd sexual fantasies, simulating oral sex and publicly discussing the virginity of one of the plaintiffs.

The suit doesn’t mention if Lizzo knew of the harassment, but it names Lizzo, whose real name is Melissa Viviane Jefferson, her production company, and her dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, as defendants. The suit brings claims for religious and racial harassment, false imprisonment, interference with prospective economic advantage, and other allegations — not all of them against the star.

“The stunning nature of how Lizzo and her management team treated their performers seems to go against everything Lizzo stands for publicly, while privately she weight-shames her dancers and demeans them in ways that are not only illegal but absolutely demoralizing,” attorney for the plaintiffs Ron Zambrano said in a statement.

The suit accuses Lizzo of calling attention to the dancer’s weight after an appearance at South by Southwest (SXSW) music festival. The singer and her choreographer later told the dancer, Arianna Davis, that she seemed “less committed” to her role — a comment the suit describes as a “thinly veiled” concern about Davis’ weight.

Representatives for Lizzo did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Quigley did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“Weight-shaming”?  That’s a stretch, considering she could have called her a lot worse than simply noting that she seemed “less committed” to her job.

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Regardless, the lawsuit isn’t likely to make Lizzo any less popular. The young women and girls who lack the self-discipline to lose weight will go on admiring Lizzo and tell themselves that if she can be rich, successful, and popular, they can be, too.