Billie Eilish's powerful monologue against body shaming
"Do you know me? Do you really know me? Do you have opinions on my opinions, on my music, on my clothes, on my body. Some people hate what I wear, others praise it, someone uses it to humiliate others or humiliate me", it is with these words that Billie Eilish debuts in "Not My Responsibility", a short film against body-shaming, presented for the first time last March on the occasion of the Where Do We Go Tour and now posted on its social channels, grinding 8 million views in just 24 hours.
Strong words against media speculation about the singer's body
Although only 18 years old, the revelation artist of the year 2019 is aware of the weight that society attaches to the image of a person, especially if it is a woman, without considering its value beyond the superficial layer. Billie's outfits are by no means random. The girl usually wears oversized clothes to hide her shapes and make sure that others, the media in the first place, have no material to speculate on, but focus only on her voice, hypnotic and suave. Yet, precisely this hiding behind extra-large clothes has caused a media obsession to gather around her figure to such an unhealthy point as to force the singer of "Bad Guy" to respond to the body-shamers to silence them a once and for all.
See also
A direct attack on the haters
"I feel your stares, always, and nothing I do remains invisible. So while I sense your disapproval or your sigh of relief, I think if I lived for them I wouldn't be able to move. Do you want me to be smaller? More weak, softer, taller? Do you want me to shut up? Are my shoulders provoking you or are they my chest, my stomach, my hips? "
These are the questions that, in the course of the monologue, Billie addresses directly to her detractors, highlighting the senselessness of their criticisms and the absurdity of the claims they make on the woman's body. A body on which the last word belongs only and exclusively to her. And so Billie strips off the clothes and insecurities she has always felt trapped by and bravely faces the eyes of those who usually scrutinize her in search of details to discredit.
The value of a person beyond appearances
"Even if you've never seen my body, you judge it and you judge me. Why? We make assumptions about people based on their size, we decide who they are and how much they are worth. If I cover myself more, if I undress, who decides who I am I? Is my worth based only on your perception? I am not responsible for your opinion of me. "
The outburst of the singer closes like this, with her progressively immersing herself in a black pool until she is completely swallowed. Once again, Billie is keen to emphasize how much the value of a person is disconnected from how it appears, inherent as it is in depth, far from gazes that stop only on the surface. And she knows her own value well, or rather, she has learned to know it and knows that "it is not her responsibility" if others catalog her only on the basis of her outfits and her measurements. A value that cannot be questioned if we consider that a girl just eighteen has won 34 awards in 2019 alone, 5 Grammy Awards in 2020 and will be the youngest artist to sign the 007 soundtrack with “No Time To Die”. Does it still seem appropriate to talk about his sweatshirts? Come on, we're all smarter than that.
