Trolls and haters thrive in the depths of the internet and exist in legions on social media. Their most recent target was a series of pictures of Selena Gomez on a yacht off the Australian coast. The singer was photographed lounging in the sun with her friends while wearing an orange and black miss-matched bikini. Almost as soon as the images hit the internet, people began body shaming Gomez.
Gomez recently underwent a kidney transplant after suffering from lupus, an autoimmune disease that attacked her kidneys. The surgery was successful, but it had complications that required Gomez to have an artery reconstructed. She has since recovered from the surgeries and has worked to become more comfortable with her surgical scars.
“It was really hard in the beginning. I remember looking at myself in the mirror completely naked and thinking about all the things that I used to bitch about and just asking, ‘Why?’” Gomez said. “I had someone in my life for a very long time who pointed out all the things that I didn’t feel great about with myself. When I look at my body now, I just see life. There are a million things I can do ― lasers and creams and all that stuff ― but I’m OK with it.”
When the issue came up again with body shamers on social media, Gomez fired back at them. The singer did not respond with anger or insults but instead with an inspirational video .The video featured a montage of Gomez and her friends enjoying themselves on the yacht with a caption that called out “the beauty myth” as “an obsession with physical perfection that traps modern woman in an endless cycle of hopelessness, self consciousness, and self-hatred as she tries to fulfill society’s impossible definition of flawless beauty.” Gomez, however, is done trying to meet unrealistic expectations. Her post when on to say that te singer has chosen to “take care of myself because I want to, not to prove anything to anyone.”
The post has gone viral on social media with well over 3 million likes and nearly 60,000 comments. Gomez friend Amy Schumer put up her own post that said she was “inspired” by Gomez. “No striving for another version of yourself,” Schumer’s post said. “Let’s love ourselves today. Just how we are.”
Gomez is merely the latest celebrity to use inspiration or humor to shut down body shamers without adding further fuel to the fire. By answering hate with encouragement and insults with inspiration, Gomez left her haters without something to fight and gave her fans a reason to smile.