Since the noughties queens are at the forefront of everyone’s minds again (Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Nicole Richie etc), let me remind you of which gal is not only the least problematic, but has also been a driving force in the fight against homophobia since way back when: Hilary Duff.
Back in the noughties, when people thought it was okay to say “that’s so gay” in a negative way, Hilary Duff took a stand by taking part in the Think Before You Speak campaign.
The campaign was created by Arnold Worldwide and the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) as an effort to educate people on the fact that the term is offensive to LGBTQIA+ people.
In the iconic 2008 ad, Hilary Duff approaches two women in a clothing store after hearing one of them say that an outfit is “so gay.”
She then schools them on why it’s so offensive and sasses them in the process. It’s a truly divine moment that’s still shared on social media to this day:
It ended up winning the Ad Council’s Gold Bell award for “Best Public Service Advertising Campaign” as it bloody well should’ve and I’ll tell ya why.
The campaign was released at a time where “that’s so gay” was being tossed around frequently and as someone who was struggling with their sexual identity at the time, I can tell you that hearing it being spouted by people (including friends) was incredibly hurtful.
It made my gay little heart sing when I saw that Hilary Duff was actively taking a stand and putting her name and face to a cause that aims to eliminate the homophobic term.
You’d think at this point people are educated enough to know that the term is not okay to be used, but apparently not because over the weekend, MAFS star Jessika Power uttered “so gay” in an Instagram Story.
I reported on the incident at the time and included Hilary Duff’s campaign vid because apparently people need some reminding as to why it’s so offensive and absolutely fucking unacceptable.
In a world filled with Jessika Powers, be a Hilary Duff.
Matty Galea is the Senior Entertainment Editor at Pedestrian who also dabbles in woo-woo stuff like astrology and crystals and has been penning horoscopes since the start of his career. He also Tweets about pop culture and astrology and posts spicy content on Instagram.
