‘Digital guillotine’: Growing online movement Block Out targets biggest names in show business
A rapidly growing social media movement is going after the biggest names in show business, vowing to punish them with a “digital guillotine”.
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A rapidly growing online movement has ramped up its attack on some of the biggest names in global show business, urging supporters to subject celebrities to a “digital guillotine”.
A-list actors Natalie Portman and Gwyneth Paltrow, reality megastars Kim Kardashian and Kylie Jenner, iconic pop star Madonna, and comedians Chelsea Handler and Sarah Silverman are on a long list of identified targets.
The Block Out campaign urges social media users to block more than 100 celebrities and any brands they are associated with.
‘Let them eat cake’
Block Out was borne out of anger at displays of wealth and glamour on show at the recent Met Gala in New York, the biggest event on the fashion industry calendar that’s organised by Vogue magazine and overseen by its famed editor Anna Wintour.
TikTok influencer Haley Kalil, better known as @kayleyybaylee online, posted a video of herself at the glitzy star-studded event mouthing the words “let them eat cake”, invoking the fabled words of Marie Antoinette during the French Revolution.
The Queen had been informed of her subjects starving – an economic crisis so bad that they couldn’t even afford bread.
Fury among the French people over the enormous gap between rich and poor led to the overthrow of the monarchy in 1793. Revolutionaries executed King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette by guillotine.
Kalil’s utterance of the phrase was seen to highlight the obliviousness of celebrities and the wealthy to wealth inequality, economic instability and critical social issues.
Protesters picketed the entrance to the Met Gala, demanding a ceasefire in the ongoing war in Gaza, where tickets cost a whopping US$75,000 (AU$113,000).
“The Block Out is the latest online movement surrounding the advocacy for an end to the Israeli occupation and genocide of Palestinian people,” the group Social Prally explained in an Instagram post.
“Since the Met Gala on May 6, this digital revolt has emerged as a ‘digital guillotine’, where users are blocking celebrities and their brands. This not only hides their content, but also their sponsored ads and any business-related marketing from social media.”
Red, yellow and green lists
The Block Out works on a traffic system, with red designating those who should be blocked and deplatformed entirely for either supporting Israel or remaining silent on the issue and wasting the potential of their mammoth online followings.
Yellow is assigned to stars who should be pressured and not platformed, in a bid to encourage them to “exercise humanity amongst those who seem to refuse”.
And green is the category of celebrities who have advocated for Palestine and should therefore be rewarded by social media users.
Until now, Social Prally explained that “there’s no concentration of clear goal on what we’re aiming for with this blocklisting, and people are blocking just to block”.
“We need to focus in on these circles and make sure attention is targeted”.
A long list of “Zionists you should block” includes Olivia Wilde, Adam Sandler, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, Chris Pine, Aubrey Plaza, Floyd Mayweather, Lana Del Ray, Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock, Will Ferrell and Katy Perry.
A significant proportion of those on the list are Jewish celebrities.
Also on the red list are “those with massive followings [who] have remained silent”, including Beyonce, Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber, Drake, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Kevin Hart, Dua Lipa, Jennifer Lopez, Lady Gaga and Timothy Chalamet.
A yellow list features personalities who “know what is happening and can’t pretend they don’t” with followers of the campaign urged to “put pressure on them and their platform to speak out”.
“If a celebrity or influencer is still silent on a massively mediatised genocide, they would rather protect their ‘image’ or business than condemn it,” Social Prally explained.
“They’d rather spend over $75k on Met Gala tickets than saving people from near certain death. They would rather be socially or economically complicit in the murder of children than even talk about it.”
Those celebrities include Billie Eilish, JoJo Siwa, Doja Cat, Charlie XCX and Troye Sivan as well as prominent social media influencers Mr Beast, Addison Rae, Emma Chamberlain, Dylan Mulvaney and Chris Olsen.
And a green list circulating among supporters of the Block Out designated those who have shown support for Palestine.
“These celebrities shave spoken out, collected or provided donations, or boycotted events,” Social Prally explained.
“This does not mean you should protect their IP [intellectual property] and support their business if they are still affiliated with silent/Zionist people.”
But they should be platformed and supported online, in a bid to encourage their famous peers to do so.
The list includes Emma Watson, Mark Ruffalo, Angelina Jolie, Macklemore, Pedro Pascal, Julia Fox, Susan Sarandon and Sandra Oh.
‘We made them rich’
Growing disillusionment online about stars who have been silent on the conflict and the plight of Palestinian civilians killed reached fever pitch in the wake of the Met Gala.
“It’s time for the people to conduct what I want to call a ‘digital guillotine.’ A ‘digitine,’ if you will,” TikTok influencer @ladyfromtheoutside declared earlier this month, kicking off the Block Out movement.
“It’s time to block all the celebrities, influencers and wealthy socialites who are not using their resources to help those in dire need. We gave them their platforms. It’s time to take it back, take our views away, our likes, our comments, our money.”
Since the furore over her video, which some critics said was like watching “from District 12” in reference to the film series The Hunger Games, Kalil has deleted the TikTok and apologised for causing offence.
She clarified that she hadn’t actually attended the Met Gala but was working as a red carpet reporter for E! News outside.
But her attempt at an apology backfired when explaining she hadn’t spoken out about Gaza because “I’m not informed enough to talk about it in a meaningful and educational way”.
Kalil has lost about 100,000 followers in the wake of the controversy.
According to NBC News, social media analytics indicated many of those stars who feature on the red list have also seen their online follower numbers fall.
At the weekend, Palestinian journalist Bisan Owda, who has chronicled the Gaza conflict on social media, urged more users to join the Block Out movement.
“Let’s all block the people who we made famous and rich … who are living in a fantasy world … destroying our environment, society, harmony and economy, and don’t even put some effort to educate themselves about us, the 99 per cent of the world’s population who made them,” Owda said in an Instagram video.
As of Tuesday, the Palestinian Health Authority said some 35,000 people – mostly civilians, many of them women and children, have been killed since Israel’s ground and air assault began.
Humanitarian groups report some 2.3 million people living in the Palestinian territory have been displaced.
Originally published as ‘Digital guillotine’: Growing online movement Block Out targets biggest names in show business
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