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The trends that were once confined to Discord servers and convention floors have now gone mainstream.Doja Cat reveals shocking celeb trick for getting attention: 'Virtue signaling'
Want to make yourself the center of attention — without people thinking you're a bad person?
"Jealous Type" singer Doja Cat has revealed a trick long-favored by celebrities when weighing in on the latest scandal — and you don't even have to know anything about the topic at hand.
Welcome to the wonderful world of virtue signaling.
'What I was doing yesterday was virtue signaling ... something that I could leverage.'
The pop star's revelation came after actor Timothée Chalamet appeared on a CNN & Variety town hall, where he ruffled feathers with his passing remarks on the commercial irrelevance of opera and ballet.
"I don't want to be working in ballet or opera or, you know, things where it's like, 'Hey, keep this thing alive!'" Chalamet said to co-host Matthew McConaughey.
Whiny dancer
The comments prompted backlash from many in the entertainment industry, including Doja Cat — real name Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini — who lashed out at Chalamet in a TikTok video.
After mocking the actor, she claimed that "people [do] give a f**k" about opera and ballet, and she praised its decorum.
"You show up in a nice outfit. You sit the f**k down and shut the f**k up," she said. "That's the usual etiquette around those things. Maybe learn something from that."
Mea culpa
Just one day later, however, Dlamini was singing a different tune.
"I know nothing about opera. I know nothing about ballet," she offered in a short, contrite follow-up.
"I've never been to a ballet. I've never seen an opera," she revealed. "And I took it upon myself yesterday to kind of give it to the man because there is a culture based around outrage and things like that, and people want to feel like they're part of something. It's a need to connect, whether good or bad," she added.
Dlamini then took her confession a step further and told fans she was only doing it for views.
RELATED: Timothée Chalamet is right: Opera and ballet are dying — and you'll never guess why
Rare honesty
The blunt confession was a rare moment of honesty in a culture generally concerned with trading outrage for clicks.
"What I was doing yesterday was virtue signaling because I wanted to connect, and I knew that Timothée's goof-up was something that I could leverage in order for people to connect with me and f**k with me," the Los Angeles native went on.
“And it's easy. It's a modern way to garner clicks, likes, approval, and all kinds of things like that from people. And so I did that yesterday, and I didn't really think about why I was doing it."
RELATED: Gene Simmons' advice for celeb activists Ben Stiller, Mark Ruffalo: 'Shut the f**k up'
'Wanted a hug'
"That was the perfect material for me to seem sincere. But the truth is, I don't know anything about opera. I don't know anything about ballet, and I've never been to either shows," she said.
The 30-year-old also displayed some vulnerability when she discussed the deeper motivations behind her reaction.
"I think I just wanted a hug. I think that's all that I wanted. I wanted a hug. I wanted to feel like I was part of something bigger than myself. I wanted to be pat on the back the way everybody else is patting each other on the back in the comments sections. And I wanted to look like a hero, and that's what happened. And when I got it, I didn't like it so much," she said.
The half-Jewish, half-South African has been wildly successful over just five studio albums. She has gone platinum five times between 2019 and 2023, with her music gaining recognition in Switzerland, Sweden, and Great Britain.
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TikTok will no longer be on trial when it comes to a lawsuit that claims Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube have platforms that are addicting and harmful to children.
The lawsuit, which involves a 19-year-old plaintiff going only by KGM, says the social networks caused her to become addicted to the apps and led to depression and suicidal thoughts.
'New families every day ... are speaking out and bringing Big Tech to court for its deliberately harmful products.'
TikTok has reportedly decided to settle and agreed in principle just hours before jury selection started in Los Angeles this week. Bloomberg Law reported that along with TikTok, Snap Inc. — owner of Snapchat — also reached a confidential settlement with the woman on January 20.
"Plaintiff KGM and defendant TikTok have reached an agreement in principle to settle her case," Joseph VanZandt, the woman's attorney, reportedly said in a statement.
The trial, which will continue with the other social media companies later this year, is just one of many that claim the sites are harmful, addictive, and otherwise have failed to protect children.
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While this is the first case to go to trial, there are thousands of complaints from users and families that have sparked other lawsuits in Santa Fe, New Mexico, New York City, and the Northern District of California.
For example, in the Northern District of California, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube were accused of "relentlessly" pursuing growth and "recklessly" ignoring the impacts their products have on children's mental health.
In that case, Instagram's former head of safety and well-being testified that Meta had a "17x" strike policy toward those who reportedly engaged in "trafficking of humans for sex."
"You could incur 16 violations for prostitution and sexual solicitation, and upon the 17th violation, your account would be suspended," the former employee claimed, citing internal documents.
Meta strongly denied the claims, stating, "We strongly disagree with these allegations, which rely on cherry-picked quotes and misinformed opinions in an attempt to present a deliberately misleading picture."
"The full record will show that for over a decade, we have listened to parents, researched issues that matter most, and made real changes to protect teens," Meta went on.
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The settlement between TikTok and KGM should come as no surprise, said Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project.
"This was only the first case — there are hundreds of parents and school districts in the social media addiction trials that [have started], and sadly, new families every day who are speaking out and bringing Big Tech to court for its deliberately harmful products," she said in a statement provided to Blaze News.
If social media apps are found guilty in these trials, it could set a huge precedent for high-value settlements and possibly lead to sweeping regulation for how the sites handle youth accounts.
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