Sydney Sweeney just delivered a master class in how to reject Hollywood’s performative liberal game
Would Sydney Sweeney care to explain herself to the lunatic scolds?
No, she would not — and thank goodness for that.
The starlet, who is promoting her new movie, “Christy,” sat down with GQ for a new interview in which she was shamed for — possibly, maybe — holding conservative views.
The writer tried to coax some sort of mea culpa from Sweeney for starring in a punny American Eagle ad in which she invoked her “great jeans” and showed off her famous cleavage. The summer campaign was based on an iconic 1980s Calvin Klein ad in which Brooke Shields used similar jeans/genes wordplay, but mentally ill critics in the media and on Tiktok claimed Sweeney was propping up Nazism and eugenics.
A more absurd news cycle, I cannot recall.
In a video, the GQ writer attempts to get Sweeney to praise Donald Trump, noting that he supported her via Truth Social during the height of Titler-gate.
The president weighing in was “surreal,” said Sweeney, who then dismissed the whole brouhaha — noting she was too busy filming a new season of “Euphoria” to get hung up on it all.
But the interviewer, seemingly determined to prove the actress is Eva Braun in distressed denim, responds:
“The criticism of the content, which is that maybe, specifically in this political climate, white people shouldn’t joke about genetic superiority, like that was kind of the criticism, broadly speaking, and since you are talking about this I just wanted to give you the opportunity to talk about that, specifically.”
This is the same magazine that, in August, published a fawning profile of streamer Hasan Piker — the man who said, “America deserved 9/11.” GQ casually characterized that disgusting statement as “one of his most infamous wisecracks.”
Being a terror apologist is just being goofy. Being white in a denim campaign that uses a pun, that’s the real atrocity. Never Forget.
God bless, her Sweeney remained cool.
“I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear,” she said.
In other words, go pound sand.
Unlike most of her peers, the 28-year-old clearly does not feel the need to participate in the performative left-wing political rituals demanded of celebrities.
And by refusing to complain or explain, Sweeney shows she’s the most secure person in Hollywood.
There is, the GQ writer warns, “a chance that somebody will get some idea about what you think about certain issues.”
Translation: They might think you’re a filthy conservative.
The interview reveals more about media hall monitors than it does about Sweeney. “I know who I am. I know what I value. I know that I’m a kind person,” she says.
It’s particularly rich to revive the AE campaign, given how many wags and outlets — including the New York Times — went through pains to convince us that the Nazi backlash was an online creation of the right wing. No one had actually accused Sweeney of being a Third Reich babe.
But here we go again. “White Lotus” actress Aimee Lou Wood — who made a federal case of her teeth being parodied on “Saturday Night Live” — posted a green nausea-face emoji in response to this week’s story. Celebrity photographer and activist Misan Harriman also took to instagram to blast Sweeney.
“Presuming that you are not a white supremacist, at least say how horrified you were by how this campaign was amplified and celebrated by unrepentant racists who believe in eugenics,” he commented, adding: “At least recognise the harm your jeans campaign has caused black folk … “
Nope, no irrational controversy to see here.
But it’s always something with Sweeney, who remains our era’s biggest lightning rod. Whether being accused of harboring MAGA beliefs for throwing a country-hoedown birthday party for her mom or making jokes about her ample rack on “SNL,” she can’t sneeze without causing a cultural tsunami.
And yet, she doesn’t whistle at the praise or bristle at the backlash.
The actress is not playing anyone’s game.That angers some people and keeps others on the edge of their seats. But neither camp can wait to see what she does next.