Sabrina Carpenter advocates for transgender rights during MTV VMAs performance
Pop star Sabrina Carpenter used her platform during the MTV VMAs to advocate for the rights of transgender people.
The singer first delivered a rendition of her new track ‘Tears’, taken from her latest album Man’s Best Friend. During the performance, a group of transgender people and drag queens joined her to dance on stage.
As they danced, they held up signs with messages that included: “In trans we trust,” “Dolls, dolls, dolls,” “If you hate, you’ll never get laid,” “Love each other,” “Support drag,” and “Protect trans rights,” among various other slogans.
Subsequently, later in the night, when Carpenter won the award for ‘Best Album’, she spoke in support of the transgender community.
She said: “This world, as we all know, can be so full of criticism and discrimination and negativity,” before adding, “So to get to be part of something that can bring light, make you smile, make you dance, and make you feel like the world is your fucking oyster. I’m so grateful to do that.”
Carpenter is the latest celebrity to speak out in favour of transgender rights, as the community is coming under increasing marginalisation in society. Notably, US President Donald Trump recently took steps to ban transgender people from military service, as he did during his last administration.
Elsewhere, in acknowledging her win for Man’s Best Friend, the ‘Please Please Please’ singer said she is the “luckiest girl in the world” before joking, “I really don’t take for granted when you guys take the time out of your lives to listen to an album and if I’m lucky enough that that is my album, I am so grateful whether that be Short n’ Sweet or whether that be Man’s Best Friend, my new album, or whether it be one of my 29 [albums] before that.”
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