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Harry Styles Isn't Allowed to Have a Female Friend, Unless It's Lizzo

Though it’s embarrassing, I have to admit that I do love celebrity drama. The entertainment it provides me with knows no bounds, especially now that I'm spending a majority of my time with my eyes glued to a screen. 


As you are probably already aware, last weekend Harry Styles and Olivia Wilde were spotted holding hands at a wedding. Sources claim that Olivia was Harry's 'plus-one'. Currently, Styles and Wilde are colleagues and are working together on Wilde’s new film, Don’t Worry, Darling, which also stars Florence Pugh and Gemma Chan. With this context, it’s not hard to understand why they would be spending lots of time together and being affectionate towards one another in public. 

Here is the photo that broke the internet last week:

Photo via Page Six

But he’s Harry Styles, and she’s Olivia Wilde, and naturally, these photos have cause the internet to completely lose its mind. A source that spoke to People magazine even went so far as to claim that they have been dating for a few weeks now.


Okay, yeah. There may be some validity to this claim. It’s natural that the press is going to assume celebrities are dating each other whenever they have an outing together, but we'd be daft to pretend that there isn't a clear double standard here.


Last January, Harry Styles and Lizzo were awfully close; spending lots of time together, making guest appearances at one another's live shows (see: Harry joining Lizzo onstage for a duet of her song, "Juice"), and publicly holding hands at an award show. Yet, the media didn’t immediately jump to the conclusion that Harry and Lizzo were dating and the question is, why?


The double standard exists here because Lizzo is a black, plus-size woman, and Olivia Wilde is a thin, white woman. Lizzo doesn’t fit conventional standards of beauty or aesthetic relationships, and this is exactly why the media didn’t explode last year when she and Harry were seen being flirty on multiple occasions.


This is by no means an attempt to slander Olivia Wilde. She is a beautiful, brilliant, and incredibly talented woman. It is also by no means her fault that she is white and skinny. However, these physical characteristics are what fuels the difference in tabloid coverage. When you compare the coverage of Harry and Lizzo with Harry and Olivia, the distinction is pretty clear.

Here's what fans had to say on Twitter about the difference in media coverage:





 


I'd like to think that these two tweets are the closest to reality, but who knows? 


 

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