Is billie eilish queer, or is she just queerbaiting?
Do you even know what queerbaiting is! The young star has found herself in the middle
of controversies and accusations about her sexuality and we have all the details for you.
So remember to hit that subscribe button to get all the hot celebs gossips as soon as they arise.
Before we get into the controversy, shall we take an English class for this one?
The word “bait” is used because this is perceived as a technique to draw in
LGBTQ+ fans, yet only leads to disappointment when nothing is confirmed, or developed any further.
Urban Dictionary defines queerbaiting as: “When an author/director/etc. gives hints, and clever
twists to paint a character as possibly being queer, to satisfy queer audiences and gather fans
from the community, but never outright says they are so they can keep their heterosexual audience.”
Now class is dismissed... So how the hell is Billie accused of queerbaiting?
Since Billie has released her latest music video, Lost Cause,
and she’s been receiving a lot of comments about her sexuality from her fans and the
LGBTQA+ community. The video depicts a group of women at a slumber party,
where they take part in water gun fights, playing Twister, playing video games,
spraying each other with silly strings, eating snacks, dancing, and cuddling together in bed.
I mean that’s a normal girls slumber party and it shows how girls sometimes crave other women’s
energy. Just another normal girls’ night in. Sounds cute, doesn’t it!
Yeah, but When the singer posted the video on her Instagram account, she captioned the post
“I love girls,” which led fans to wonder if she was coming out.
And what really sprinkled some spice over the controversy is that
the music video was released on pride month! Twitter comments from some fans included “Is
Billie Eilish bi? Or did I just watch four minutes of queerbaiting done by a straight person?”
While some fans were upset and accused Billie of queerbaiting with her video and caption,
others asserted that Billie shouldn’t be pushed to label her sexuality.
“The conversation around queerbaiting has reached a confusing place — on one hand,
we say don’t worry abt labels and on the other hand, if an artist presents even remotely ‘queer’
we interrogate them abt their sexuality?” wrote one supportive fan. While another pointed out,
“I’m a gay man myself and I love girls too. Am I straight baiting if I say that?”
One fan stressed their frustrations about the accusations on the platform,
and explained that queer-baiting is “pretending that you’re queer for clout”
“If Billie Eilish says that she’s straight, then she’s straight. She’s not trying to
deceive anyone,” they continued. “Sexuality is not like this rigid
binary... stop forcing everything into boxes and forcing labels on everything.
“No one should have to come out. Coming out is kind of f**king antiquated, to be honest,
it’s really important to a lot of people and that’s great.
“But it reinforces the idea first that you have to be anything, and second that
you’re straight until proven otherwise.” Some celebrities and queer public figures
have come out as well to defend billie like matt who tweeted: “ my only thoughts
on Billie Eilish “queerbaiting” is that more than 100 anti-trans bills have been introduced
in state legislatures this year and they are all infinitely more harmful than a 19 year old
publicly exploring her sexuality without labels” Drag race UK runner up bimini bon boulash has
also tweeted: “ My hot take on the Billie Eilish ‘queer baiting’. Can’t a human experiment their
sexuality without the need of labelling? Why do we assume everyone has to be straight until
proven otherwise? Less labels more love He then made another tweet saying:
“Also there have been tonnes of MALE musicians that get away with blurring
the lines of gender and sexuality and are praised for it. We hold females at a higher
standard. If Billie is straight good, if she isn’t great. Is anyone fully 100% straight?”
Eilish hasn’t responded directly to the controversy surrounding her recent Instagram post
yet. However, the Grammy Award-winner did like a supportive post shared by a fan. The fan’s post
read: “This fandom is so embarrassing sometimes like why would you go in someone's comments and
say something that you literally don't even know is true and something y'all LITERALLY MADE UP,
sometimes y'all are so dumb. Some of you just need to learn how to mind your business.”
By liking that post, billie leaves a subtle hint as to where she stands on
the backlash. 💓
In the days following the “queerbaiting” claims, Eilish also uploaded a selfie to
Instagram with the caption “I’m tireeeddddddd,” which some fans believe may have been a reference
to the recent social media fallout. And honestly, I too am tireeedddddd!
And that’s not the first accusation of insulting the LGBTQA+ community
and queerbaiting that Billie had to face. Remember her song “ wish you were gay?”
That one was a huge deal too, she received a lot of backlashes
Billie Eilish has responded to the backlash over Wish You Were Gay In an interview with
Pop Buzz, the 17-year-old (at that time) explained: “First off I want to be so clear
that it’s so not supposed to be an insult. I feel like it’s been a little bit misinterpreted. I
tried so hard to not make it in any way offensive. “The whole idea of the song is, it’s kind of a
joke. It’s kind of like, ‘I’m an ass and you don’t love me.’ And you don’t love me because you don’t
love me and that’s the only reason and I wish you didn’t love me because you didn’t love girls.”
When the pop ballad was released earlier this week,
the American singer-songwriter was accused of queer-baiting because of lyrics such as:
“I can’t tell you how much I wish I didn’t wanna stay / I just kinda wish you were gay.”
Fans also expected the star to be singing about a woman.
The track is the fourth single taken from her highly-anticipated debut album,
When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? It follows songs such as You Should See Me in
a Crown, When The Party’s Over and Bury a Friend, the latter of which became her highest-charting
single in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada. The thing is, we’ve never heard Billie talking
about her boyfriends or girlfriends or anyone for that matter! Billie has never named names
when it comes to her past relationships, but she has spoken about them generally.
In August 2019, Billie revealed to 3Voor12, that while she wasn't in love at that moment,
she had been in the past. In June 2020, Billie opened up, even more,
telling British GQ that her past boyfriends never made her feel desired. "None of them," she said.
"And it’s a big thing in my life that I feel I have never been physically desired by somebody."
She also admitted that she has had her heartbroken. "People
have done some terrible sh*t to me," she said.
"The crazy sh*t I have gone through. I have never felt powerful in a relationship.
I did once and, guess what, I took advantage of that person’s kindness. I wasn’t used to it."
I think it’s pretty obvious why she doesn’t like talking about that part of her personal life.
These days, Billie doesn't seem to be interested in anyone at all.
"It’s been months and I am not attracted to people anymore," she said. "I don’t know what’s going
on... It’s actually kind of dope." Girl, i hear you!
Billie has also admitted before that she doesn’t really read comments anymore:
"I stopped reading comments fully because it was ruining my life," she said. "Once again."
"It's weird, the cooler things you get to do are, the most people hate you. It's crazy."
When asked by BBC Breakfast interviewer Louise Minchin how to make it better,
Billie added, "I don't know dude. It's crazy. Cancel culture is insane.
"The internet is a bunch of trolls. A problem is that a lot of it is really funny.
I think that's the issue, I think that's why nobody really stops.
"I've experienced that. Growing up, I'd say things that people would laugh at and then
later I'd realise that wasn't cool to say." "It's way worse than it's ever been. It's
insane that I've been reading comments up until this point. I should have stopped long ago.
"The problem is that I've wanted to stay in touch with the fans and keep talking to them,
but people have ruined that for me. The internet is ruining my life so I stay off."
And that kinda explains why she hasn’t really addressed anything about the accusations directly.
What are your takes on this? Do you think that she was actually queerbaiting? Or just exploring her
sexuality? Or nothing about sexuality at all? Let us know in the comments section.