Seething with frustration at not being able to get police removed from Washington DC’s Pride festival and march in June, QPOC (Queer People of Color) activists groups No Justice No Pride DC and the Black Youth Project 100, are now setting their sites on Miley Cyrus will headline DC’s Pride festival concert calling her choice an ‘extension of white gay obliviousness”
This new attack on DC pride and Cyrus supposedly stems from a Billboard interview, Cyrus discussed her musical evolution away from hip-hop and toward country sounds, saying she liked Kendrick Lamar‘s song “Humble”: “I love that because it’s not ‘Come sit on my dick, suck on my cock,’” she told John Norris. “I can’t listen to that anymore. That’s what pushed me out of the hip-hop scene a little. It was too much ‘Lamborghini, got my Rolex, got a girl on my cock’ — I am so not that.”
Preston Mitchum, writer and member of Black Youth Project 100 states: Cyrus “decided to call out the misogyny of black artists, but didn’t call out any other forms of artistry or genres that are also misogynistic,”
Drew Ambrogi, spokesperson at local LGBT activist group No Justice No Pride DC went as far to say that Cyrus is “someone who’s ripped off black culture and profited from it, then in a recent interview has tried to diminish it,”
This is just the latest attack from QPOC activists who feel that PRIDE has become commodified and compromised by sponsorships from certain entities including Wells Fargo. Activists are frustrated with what they describe as a lack of people of color, trans, and other more marginalized individuals in visible and decision-making roles.
“Miley Cyrus headlining Capital Pride is both a manifestation and an extension of white gay obliviousness,” says Samantha Master, another member of Black Youth Project 100. “I just really wish DC Pride and Prides across the country really took into account the needs and experiences of all LGBT people,” says Mitchum, “the LGBT people who are experiencing homelessness, the ones who are impoverished, the ones who are unemployed or underemployed, the ones who experience hate crimes, the ones who don’t get enough attention on TV.”
Cyrus, a longtime LGBT rights supporter Miley Cyrus founded the Happy Hippy Foundation whose mission statement which is “to rally young people to fight injustice facing homeless youth, LGBTQ youth and other vulnerable populations”
Miley Cyrus will be joining Capital Pride as part of a diverse group of entertainment that includes Tinashe, The Pointer Sisters, and VASSY,” a Pride spokesperson told the Washingtonian in an email. “DC has a homeless youth crisis on our hands, with almost half of all homeless youth identifying as being LGBTQ. Miley and others have actively worked to reduce youth homelessness, particularly among our community.”