Halsey opens up about her privilege as a white-passing biracial woman
5 June 2020, 13:14
Halsey calls out the police at Black Lives Matter protest
"It’s my place to help. I am in pain for my family, but nobody is gonna kill me based on my skin color."
As well as actively protesting in Los Angeles in response to racial injustice and police brutality following the murder of George Floyd, Halsey is using her platform to talk about racism and her own experiences as a biracial woman, who is white-passing.
Over the past week, Halsey has been in LA, supporting and marching alongside Black Lives Matter protesters. She has been updating her fans and followers with resources and has even been sharing scenes from the demonstration on social media, including details of some of the violent ways in which the police are behaving.
Now, Halsey is also addressing her own privilege after a Twitter user accused her of not embracing her black side.
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Halsey is biracial, and she has spoken about her own experiences multiple times throughout her career.
In response to a now-deleted tweet that claimed she doesn't embrace her "black side" when talking about the protests and Black Lives Matter, Halsey said: “I’m white-passing. It’s not my place to say ‘we.’ It’s my place to help. I am in pain for my family, but nobody is gonna kill me based on my skin color."
She continued: "I’ve always been proud of who I am but it’d be an absolute disservice to say ‘we’ when I’m not susceptible to the same violence.”
im white passing. it’s not my place to say “we”. it’s my place to help. i am in pain for my family, but nobody is gonna kill me based on my skin color. I’ve always been proud of who I am but it’d be an absolute disservice to say “we” when I’m not susceptible to the same violence. https://t.co/2p6RVJixwl
— h (@halsey) June 3, 2020
In a previous interview with Playboy, Halsey explained: "I’m white-passing. I’ve accepted that about myself and have never tried to control anything about black culture that’s not mine. I’m proud to be in a biracial family, I’m proud of who I am, and I’m proud of my hair."
“I look like a white girl, but I don’t feel like one. I’m a Black woman. So it’s been weird navigating that,” she continued.
You can read Halsey's full 2017 Playboy interview here.
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