Welcome to Shade Court, where Judge Brown is in absolutely no mood for your bullshit.
In this week’s Shade Court, Amy Schumer handles some trolls, a shady Animal Shelter hits a home run and Miley Cyrus couldn’t shade Nicki Minaj if the ghost of drag queens past inhabited her twerk-deficient body.
Shade Court Docket #2015JZ000131
The Case: Britney Spears is trucking away in Las Vegas, counting her money and hopefully enjoying the (relative) peace she deserves. Britney is also a single ladaaaay and is letting everyone know it. During a recent concert, Britney went off-script (I assume) and served a few hot words about singledom and men in general.
“Being single for a year has been very, very, very profound and I feel like all men should suck my toe!”
The problem here is that Britney was dating some dude named Charlie Ebersol (lol who?) for about eight months until they broke up this June… so like, two months ago.
The Defendant: E! Online
The Evidence:
The Deliberation: Sometimes I’ll forget that Britney is from Louisiana and then she’ll do something like this, and it all comes back to me.
When did Britney get so damn good and flagrant with her shade? Between this and that beautiful jab at Iggy Azalea, she’s quickly climbing the ranks. She just showed us one of the best possible ways to throw daggers at an ex.
If you publicly talk shit, you’re probably going to labeled as angry or bitter because we live in a world of sexist bullshit. Anything that seems too calculated will make it seem like you still care. This was perfect. Just straight-up erasing history—acting like eight entire months of your life didn’t matter, or even exist.
Her flippancy towards the entire situation—first the relationship, then its timeline and then just blurting it out during a random concert—manages to hit ol’ Charlie with a one-two punch with seemingly as little effort as possible. It doesn’t get any colder than that.
The Ruling: Shade
Shade Court Docket #2015JZ000132
The Case: Some clowns on Twitter tried to make fun of Amy Schumer by saying that she looks like the woman from the Grant Wood painting, American Gothic. Amy’s response was clever-ish and she took it all in stride as one must do if they are to maintain their sanity in the sea of Twitter where idiocy gushes like a BP oil spill.
The Defendant: Lucky magazine
The Evidence:
The Deliberation: To be clear, Lucky is saying that Amy was shaded by the trolls on Twitter. Even if it was the other way around, however, they’d still be wrong. Mediocre jokes that insult someone’s appearance are not shade. And any use of the hashtag #NoDisrespect should result in jail time.
The Ruling: Not shade
Shade Court Docket #2015JZ000133
The Case: On Tuesday, NFL quarterback Michael Vick was rumored to be signing a contract with the Pittsburgh Steelers (and eventually did). You may remember that Vick served time in prison for operating an illegal dog fighting operation back in 2008.
With the rumors abound, the Pittsburgh Animal Rescue League stepped in and fired off a Tweet where they so just happened to shout-out the kindness of another professional sports team in Pittsburgh.
The Defendant: The Pittsburgh Animal Rescue League
The Evidence:
The Deliberation: I should note that a website called Sporting News did identify this stunt as shade. However, writer Sean Gentille either wrote or approved the headline “Michael Vick takes extreme shade from Pittsburgh animal shelter,” which is stupid and embarrassing on so many levels and is a perfect example of why straight white men should probably shy away from using the word unless they’ve been trained by a professional. Because even looking at that headline makes me want cleanse myself by signing up for a voguing competition in order to properly honor the spirit of Dorian Corey, I’m going to ignore their usage—also because a whole bunch of you submitted this item to me already.
Anyway, I have to hand it to the Pittsburgh Animal Rescue League. I love how they led with a vague, “on days like this,” with no mention specifically of either Michael Vick or the Steelers. They sort of undermined that subtly later by retweeting someone who called for collecting Steelers merchandise and using them for rags, but I’ll ignore that.
If it wasn’t already clear, shouting out Pittsburgh’s professional hockey team made that line in the sand much more obvious. Seriously, who do they have writing these tweets over that the Pittsburgh Animal Rescue League? Subtle, obvious, biting and hilarious all at the same time. Judge Brown approves.
As sort of a side note, I feel that it is important to add that yes, what Michael Vick did was bad. However, if you’re one of those people that is so indignant and worked up over Michael Vick joining the Steelers, please do remember that the Pittsburgh Steelers have employed and celebrated Ben Roethlisberger for over a decade—a man who has been accused of sexual assault multiple times and is pretty widely assumed to probably be guilty. So yeah, fighting dogs is bad, but raping women is definitely worse.
The Ruling: Shade
Shade Court Docket #2015JZ000134
The Case: Miley Cyrus sat down for an interview with the New York Times as a lead-up to her hosting gig for the 2015 Video Music Awards this Sunday. In the interview, Miley Cyrus said a lot of incredibly dumb shit about Nicki Minaj.
She may have alluded to “Wrecking Ball” also, saying that when a naked white girl breaks a Vevo record she gets nominated.
I didn’t follow it. You know what I always say? Not that this is jealousy, but jealousy does the opposite of what you want it to — that’s a yoga mantra. People forget that the choices that they make and how they treat people in life affect you in a really big way. If you do things with an open heart and you come at things with love, you would be heard and I would respect your statement. But I don’t respect your statement because of the anger that came with it.
And it’s not anger like, “Guys, I’m frustrated about some things that are a bigger issue.”
You made it about you. Not to sound like a bitch, but that’s like, “Eh, I didn’t get my V.M.A.”
But she was ——
If you want to make it about race, there’s a way you could do that. But don’t make it just about yourself. Say: “This is the reason why I think it’s important to be nominated. There’s girls everywhere with this body type.”
I think she did say that ——
What I read sounded very Nicki Minaj, which, if you know Nicki Minaj is not too kind. It’s not very polite. I think there’s a way you speak to people with openness and love. You don’t have to start this pop star against pop star war. It became Nicki Minaj and Taylor in a fight, so now the story isn’t even on what you wanted it to be about. Now you’ve just given E! News “Catfight! Taylor and Nicki Go at It.”
I know you can make it seem like, Oh I just don’t understand because I’m a white pop star. I know the statistics. I know what’s going on in the world. But to be honest, I don’t think MTV did that on purpose.
The Defendant: Hollywood Life, Complex
The Evidence:
Complex:
Hollywood Life:
The Deliberation: Let’s talk about this. Miley Cyrus has never revealed herself to be a particularly smart person, but this is a new level of stupid even for her. What is truly incredible is how both Miley and Taylor’s responses to Nicki’s critique exactly prove Nicki’s point in the first place.
Miley really went in there laying down the “angry black woman,” card. In 2015 if you’re going to run around calling a black woman angry—especially when all Nicki did was tweet her opinion sans all-caps and sans profanity— you know what you’re doing.
Also, hey Miley, Nicki made it about her because she was talking about her personal experiences with what she felt was discrimination, ya dipshit.
The suggestion that the only statements or criticisms worthy respect are the ones that are given nicely is probably the whitest thing I’ve ever heard. Anger is a valid emotion and people have a right to get upset or angry, particularly about, oh I dunno, RACISM.
The fact that Destiny Hope Cyrus, (which was beautifully described on Twitter as a “confederate flag ass name,”) thinks she has the right to instruct any damn body on how they should speak about race is truly a wonder of white privilege. Miley “I’m going to use black women as props” Cyrus. Miley “gimme that urban sound” Cyrus. Miley “colonizer #1 of twerking” Cyrus.
To believe that as a white woman you can or should offer suggestions to a black women on how best to approach discussing racial politics is idiotic as it is incorrect.
I’m not even going to comment on her calling Nicki “not too kind” and impolite because I hope Nicki will take care of that herself this Sunday with the shadiest shade parade that ever did take place. Let’s also remember not too long ago when Miley was stanning for Nicki like the basic ass fan that she is.
P. S. Miley’s undetectable ass can’t twerk and never could.
The Ruling: Not shade
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Images via Getty. Top image by Tara Jacoby, featuring the shade artist at a young age.