by Gemma Murphy (she/her)
TikTok musician @savana_santos has found herself facing backlash after releasing a song with the word “lesbo” in it, a derogatory word for lesbian.
The song opens with the lyrics “Hey mom, I like boys too. I’m not a raging full on lesbo, wait I was for like a second.”
The singer shared her most recent song to the social media app yesterday and has been inundated with comments that the song is lesbophobic. With comments from fellow TikTok users such as: “No way you thought this was a good idea” and “as a REAL lesbian, that lyric was not necessary”.
The video has over 300,000 views and over 1000 people have made videos using the sound to react and show their displeasure to the lyrics.
Santos has posted another video as a statement which reads:
*Content warning – mention of suicide *
“Hi. Just wanna clear some things up, a) I am a lesbian, but my sexuality is sometimes fluid, and this song is me exploring that. b) I had NO idea lesbo was a derogatory term. I sincerely truly apologise for hurting a community I feel I am part of. I’m growing and learning and trying to be better everyday. I’m 100% going to change this lyric. c) You can think my music is absolute TRASH but please stop telling me to kill myself. There’s a real person on the other side of the screen”.
she/her
@gemmamurfy
@s0y.division
@abeanwithabook