PARIS.- DJ Barbara Butch, protagonist of the scene drag queens appeared at the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics, filed a complaint for cyberbullying, death threats and public insults, a source close to the case said today (July 30).
The artist, a feminist and lesbian activist, denounced on her Instagram account yesterday that she has been the target of yet another cyberbullying, particularly violent after her performance.
“Barbara Butch decided to file a complaint after being threatened with death, torture and rape, and the target of numerous anti-Semitic, homophobic, sexist and fatphobic insults,” said her lawyer Audrey Msellati in a statement shared on the social network by the DJ.
Drag queen scene at the Olympics
Butch acted in a scene titled Festivity, which begins with the image of a group around a table, including numerous drag queens, and which some sectors understood as a mockery of Jesus’ last supper with the apostles.
The sequence was criticised by far-right politicians, Donald Trump and the French bishopric, which deplored the mockery and ridicule of Christianity.
The director of the opening ceremony, Thomas Jolly, denied that it had been inspired by Jesus’ last supper and said that it was more a matter of throwing a great pagan party linked to the gods of Olympus.
The Games’ organising committee has strongly condemned the cyberbullying of the ceremony’s artistic team. “We stand by them and support them,” said its communications director, Anne Descamps.
The French artist said on her Instagram account that at first she decided not to take the floor to let the haters (haters) to calm down. “But the messages I was receiving were increasingly extreme,” he said.
“Those who attack Barbara Butch do so because they cannot stand that she can represent France, because she is a woman, a lesbian, fat, Jewish…” her lawyer told AFP.
“By attacking her, they are attacking the values, rights and freedoms of France, which she represents by her existence in the public space and above all by the fact that she acts for her country on an international stage,” Msellati added.
Source: AFP
