What's behind the Ellen DeGeneres backlash? Has she become out of touch?

Slate

DeGeneres is of course an LGBTQ pioneer. But her controversies in recent years -- from the recent allegations of a toxic workplace to befriending George W. Bush to siding with Kevin Hart in his homophobic joke controversy -- may stem from her identifying more with rich people these days. "Do I wish she would leverage her position of prominence within mainstream America to make a political statement more complex than 'We exist, and we’re not scary'? I do!" June Thomas says in a Slate conversation with Slate colleague Christina Cauterucci. I wish she behaved more like Beyoncé or director Jordan Peele, who takes pains to find Black crew and other artists to work on his movies. When I say, 'Eh, rich people gonna rich,' that doesn’t mean I excuse the behavior and the lack of oversight that Ellen appears to have displayed—but it doesn’t surprise me. I suspect the fact that her route to fame and riches went through mainstream (largely straight) America means that she’ll survive these revelations. I suspect that her audience will care much less than those of us who don’t watch. Engaged, political, progressive people will, correctly, be appalled. But as we’ve already established, we weren’t watching the show. Will anything change—other, I hope, than the most toxic employees being ousted? Will this lead to any larger reconsiderations?" Cauterucci adds: "'Rich people gonna rich' is the one enduring truth in human history. And it’s why the first very public reckoning with Ellen’s persona happened when she watched a sports game and took a smiley little selfie with George W. Bush. That moment was an important education in intersectionality for some people. Ellen isn’t just a woman, and she’s not just gay. She’s white, she’s rich, she’s famous. She has more in common with the rich community (yes, that’s an identity group!) than with the broader gay community. So, of course, she’s going to have more allegiance to George W. Bush and to Kevin Hart than to any of her lower-paid employees or any of us run-of-the-mill gays. As to the question of whether anything will change, I do think the disparity in lifestyle that quarantine has made more visible may be planting a few seeds of revolution among unlikely groups. Ellen got dragged when she tweeted in April that being quarantined in her expansive, lavish home was akin to 'being in jail.' People are going hungry, losing their jobs, losing loved ones, and Ellen—someone they may have looked to for comfort and a moment of joy—is complaining about having to spend too much time on her lanai? Then again, I don’t know if the allegations against her are explicitly, directly tied to her enough to warrant any kind of public outcry among her fans."