Billie Eilish protests body shaming during AmericanAirlines Arena concert

(Jeff Kravitz/Filmmagic)

MIAMI – Billie Eilish is an artist who doesn’t rely on her sex appeal to sell her music. This is why so many in the audience on Monday night at the AmericanAirlines Arena were surprised to see her take off her top.

The 18-year-old singer, who will be performing in Orlando on Tuesday night, usually wears oversized clothes.

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In a video interlude, the Grammy winner from Los Angeles was only wearing a black bra.

“It was amazing. She is a real feminist," Natalia Suarez, 40, wrote in a text message. “I was there with my daughter and I can’t tell you how proud I felt to watch her understand the message.”

Here is her speech:

Do you really know me? You have opinions about my opinions, about my music, about my clothes, about my body. Some people hate what I wear, some people praise it. Some people use it to shame others, some people use it to shame me. But I feel you watching, always, and nothing I do goes unseen, so while I feel your stares, your disapproval or your sighs of relief, if I lived by them, I’d never be able to move.

Would you like me to be smaller? Weaker? Softer? Taller? Would you like me to be quiet? Do my shoulders provoke you? Does my chest? Am I my stomach? My hips? The body I was born with, is it not what you wanted?

If what I wear is comfortable, I am not a woman. If I shed the layers, I am a slut. Though you’ve never seen my body, you still judge it and judge me for it. Why? You make assumptions about people based on their size. We decide who they are. We decide what they’re worth.

If I wear more, if I wear less, who decides what that makes me? What that means? Is my value based only on your perception? Or is your opinion of me not my responsibility?


About the Author:

The Emmy Award-winning journalist joined the Local 10 News team in 2013. She wrote for the Miami Herald for more than 9 years and won a Green Eyeshade Award.