Pharrell Williams didn’t come for Taylor Swift directly when he told celebrities who get political to “shut up,” but based on the context of his comment and the backlash it received, he might as well have.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter published on September 11, a day after Swift endorsed Kamala Harris for president on September 10, Williams said, “I don’t do politics. In fact, I get annoyed sometimes when I see celebrities trying to tell you [who to vote for]. There are celebrities that I respect that have an opinion, but not all of them.” Seeming to quote The Chicks lyric, “shut up and sing,” Williams continued, “I’m one of them people [who says], ‘What the heck? Shut up. Nobody asked you.’ When people get out there and get self-righteous and they roll up their sleeves and shit, and they are out there walking around with a placard: ‘Shut up!’”
For one thing, if Pharrell Williams thinks nobody asked Taylor Swift to endorse a candidate for president, he’s wrong. But that’s not all he was called out for.
People began flooding the comments section of an unrelated Instagram post on Williams’s page with criticism. Some pointed out that Williams had participated in a fundraiser for the Israel Defense Forces in 2018. Another commenter noted that Williams himself endorsed Hillary Clinton for president on The Ellen Degeneres Show back in 2016. And several commenters suggested that Williams’s apolitical stance is inherently privileged. “Not ‘doing politics’ is so incredibly privileged and out of touch,” said one commenter. Another wrote, “Are you able to not do politics because you’re so wealthy that everything is accessible to you no matter who is in office?”
Williams has not yet responded to the backlash.
