As Usual, the Internet is Being Weird. This Time, It's About Diddy's Abuse Allegations
By sTACY LEE KONG
Image: instagram.com/diddy
Content warning: This newsletter contains mentions of physical and sexual violence, coercion, homophobia and misogyny. Context links may contain graphic details.
Oh, hi! Remember that time that I launched a new magazine and then did not write a newsletter for four weeks? Turns out, it can be hard to do all the things at once! But, I am still thinking about pop culture all the time and definitely still have a lot of opinions. (For example: we should probably unpack TSwift’s liberalism in the context of her friendships; there definitely needs to be an investigation into whatever is going on with Beyoncé’s career, and if her ; and I have so many thoughts on journalistic ethics and political reporter Olivia Nuzzi’s professional-turned-personal relationship with RFK Jr.—yes, as in brain worm, dead whale and bear cub RFK Jr., which YIKES.) So, thank you for bearing with me as I figure out my capacity/schedule/to-do list.
Of course, the celebrity story that has been getting the most attention this month has definitely been Diddy, so when I was thinking about what this newsletter should be about, that was the undisputed winner. If you need a refresher, The Cut’s explainer on all the allegations of sexual violence against the music mogul provides very good background, but briefly: while Diddy has long had a reputation for being physically violent (with his exes and people in his professional sphere) and shady in his business dealings, it wasn’t until 2023, when singer Cassie filed a federal lawsuit accusing him of abusing her throughout their 11-year relationship that allegations of sexual violence began to surface. As of this week, 10 other people have filed civil lawsuits against him detailing horrific instances of coercion, assault, violence, trafficking and non-consensual pornography. He has been indicted on charges of racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking and transportation for purposes of prostitution, and, since he was deemed a danger to his alleged victims, is being held without bail in a Brooklyn jail until his trial. His homes have been raided and his entertainment empire is crumbling around him. It even appears that one of his sons has participated in this alleged abusive behaviour. Which is to say, literally every single part of this news cycle is so disturbing. And yet… the internet also has so many jokes??? So this week, I want to think about a few related but distinct aspects of the public response to this news: the baby oil jokes, the conspiracy theories and the resurfacing of photos and video clips to ‘prove’ why we should have known what Diddy was doing all along.
Please, no more baby oil jokes
Obviously the part of Diddy’s indictment that was going to go the most viral was the detail that police seized “more than 1,000 bottles of baby oil and lubricant” from his properties in Miami and Los Angeles. IRL, the baby oil doesn’t really matter. As Vox pointed out earlier this week, “possessing baby oil is not a crime, and the whole oil issue doesn’t matter very much in the context of the violent and disturbing conduct of which Combs has been accused. But a federal indictment of a public figure like Combs is meant to be read, and it’s not unusual for prosecutors to include details they know will shock people and make headlines. Baby oil did the trick.” Did it ever. Online, 1,000 bottles of baby oil became the defining phrase of the news cycle, alongside the so-called “freak-offs” that Diddy hosted for his rich, famous and powerful friends. Cue the clout-chasing baby oil videos and visual gags, the AI-generated video of a bathroom stocked with rows and rows of baby oil bottles and of course, the homophobic references to Diddy’s sexuality.
There’s a lot to unpack about the way people are mischaracterizing Diddy’s actions as merely kinky or freaky—especially since it’s not just random Twitter commenters. In a supremely misguided move, actor, comedian and Elf star Faizon Love took to the internet to joke that he needed people to help him understand “the new rules,” saying “the Cassie thing, I understand. I think we should definitely lock [Diddy up for] putting his hands on a young lady, but I don’t understand the other shit. Can y’all help me? When has being nasty been a federal crime? And I’m glad they told me. I didn’t know there was a limit on baby oil… You can’t take anybody on vacation, you can’t take nobody to Vegas, damn sure don’t bring them to Atlanta.”
Now, maybe Love has poor reading comprehension—the indictment was 14 pages long and you know people have short attention spans these days. But he is also an actual adult, so he knows Diddy did not get locked up for his stock of personal care items; the mogul was arrested because, according to the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, he “abused, threatened and coerced victims to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation and conceal his conduct,” and used his business to allegedly commit various crimes, including “sex trafficking, forced labor [sic], kidnapping, arson, bribery and the obstruction of justice.” So, the fact that Love, and the other people who rushed to make jokey content about this case, felt so comfortable downplaying the severity of Diddy’s crimes gives some disturbing hints at what they think about victims of sexual violence, and raises questions about whether they even understand, or care, what consent is.
Also, maybe the legal system could refrain from publicizing the most sordid details of these cases?!
This also makes me think in a different direction. Namely: what are the ethics of law enforcement authorities seeking virality in this way? Because while I understand there are good arguments for keeping the legal system transparent and accessible to the public, this feels… uh, let’s go with misguided.
Writing in Canadian Lawyer magazine in 2022, Ottawa criminal lawyer Michael Spratt questioned the benefits of allowing “the justice system [to] become a content factory for armchair YouTube pundits, conspiracy theorists and social media personalities.” At the time, he was writing about the judge’s decision to allow cameras into the courtroom for the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard libel trial (something I’ve written about, too) and the suggestion that Canadian courts should allow TV cameras to broadcast their proceedings. I know that’s not quite the same thing as what the authorities did in this case, but I think his points still broadly apply—especially his pushback on the tactic of seeding court documents with salacious details.
“But what about education?” he writes. “The public will better understand our justice system, so it’s all worth it, right? Call me a cynic, but I bet that only the most high-profile, most outlandish, most sordid cases will ever be broadcast. So, we may better entertain, but not better educate, the public.”
Uh, yeah. Facts.
The details are bad enough, there’s no need for additional conspiracy theories
Supposedly, Diddy’s ex, Kim Porter, wrote a memoir detailing the years of abuse she suffered at his hands. Only, she did not. Oh, and years ago, Justin Bieber referenced a “Diddy party” in a song, so clearly, he’d gone to at least one of those freak-offs, even though he was a literal child at the time. Except, the song was likely created by AI. Oh, and the baby oil wasn’t baby oil, it was actually GHB. Though, authorities seized ketamine, ecstasy and actual GHB, which the U.S. attorney said was used to keep Diddy’s alleged victims “obedient and compliant,” so… probably not.
I’m not actually surprised that this case has sparked such intense speculation, and as far as conspiracy theories go, these are not as awful as they could be, I guess? But it’s so weird to me that there’s so much focus on conspiracy theories when everything Diddy has been accused of is already really, really bad. Like, we don’t need an AI-generated Justin Bieber song—we have an extremely uncomfortable series of videos with Justin Bieber that make it clear no one was protecting this child as he navigated the music industry, even if all we’re talking about is work. It kinda feels like people want to find evidence of some sex-crime secret society, because Skull and Bones shit is exciting and dramatic, I guess? But the boring truth is, many, many aspects of our society are already set up to exploit vulnerable people, and the music industry is no exception. Diddy has been charged with crimes stemming from the complex, highly orchestrated system he created specifically so he could wield control over people with far less power than him, which he was able to do because labour laws are lax, patriarchy is real, capitalism encourages exploitation, etc. etc. etc. Like… he allegedly filmed everything he did to these women (and some men) so he could blackmail them later with evidence of their abuse (or just threaten them with horrific violence) to ensure their compliance and silence. And then he invited dozens of people (at minimum) to participate. And then they did, and never told anyone about the many instances of broken consent that they saw happening—or participated themselves. That’s the conspiracy.
Revisiting old interviews is interesting, but what is it actually accomplishing?
Which relates to the last thing I wanted to touch on: the deep dives into past print articles, resurfaced interview clips and old photos, all of which are being re-contextualized by what we now know was happening in the background. The overarching vibe is true crime investigation, which is already kind of problematic because, as Spratt noted, people’s pain becomes content to feed the public’s appetite for salacious gossip and desire to play armchair detective. It also muddies the waters when it comes to fact and fiction. I think it’s fair to ask who was at these parties, saw how he treated Cassie and other women and said nothing—especially if they’re only distancing themselves from him now. But when people are compiling pictures of other celebrities who’ve taken photos with Diddy (who has been famous, and an attendee at famous-people events, for literal decades), they’re not really looking at which power players are complicit in exploitation, they’re just creating a sense of conspiracy and drama. But also, this hyper-focus on all the signs that ‘we’ missed—a 2016 Usher interview where he talked about living with Diddy for a year when he was 13 and seeing “very curious things,” a clip of Diddy making a speech at one of his infamous White Parties, joking about what was going to happen when the kids went to bed, or a super old ET interview where he said he couldn’t even get permits to throw his parties anymore and that he’d probably get arrested over them, for example—glosses over something important: in general, the public doesn’t actually want to see gender-based violence.
Because hello? The signs were all there. And not just in retrospect, when decoding or re-evaluating old clips. Beyond those Bieber videos or the Usher interview, USA Today pointed out that people have been saying this shit for years: “in a 2004 profile of Kimora Lee Simmons, she recalled a time Combs threatened to hit her while she was pregnant. In 2022, former Danity Kane member Aubrey O’Day revealed on the ‘Call Her Daddy’ podcast that her forced departure from the girl-group in 2008 was related to her refusal to do ‘what was expected of her’ by Combs in areas unrelated to music. And singer Jaguar Wright has stood her ground for years, accusing Combs' in various interviews of serious crimes… It wasn't until footage of Combs physically assaulting ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura emerged that people began listening to their stories. Why? Experts say that gender and racial bias, as well as cognitive biases like the ‘halo effect,’ contribute to the denial of sexual assault allegations — leaving survivors subject to shame and disbelief.”
That is to say, whether it was because we perceived Diddy as ‘good’ due to his success, advocacy work and the sheer length of his career, or because we were primed to downplay or disbelieve women’s (and particularly men’s) stories of broken consent, or because we just didn’t want to think too deeply about what was actually going on, or some combination of the three, most of us have been socialized not to see how Diddy treated his employees, rivals, partners, etc. Sure, it’s good that we’re looking now. But we should probably still pay attention to why it took so long.
And Did You Hear About…
Pesto the giant baby penguin. (I know everyone is obsessed with Moo Deng—for good reason, obvs—but… his name is Pesto. And he’s so large.) (I love him.)
The eight former Giller Prize winners—including Michael Ondaatje, Madeleine Thien and Lynn Coady—who are calling for the Prize to “divest from companies whose products are enabling the mass killing in Gaza.”
Scaachi Koul’s excellent analysis of why Brad Pitt is still famous.
This smart piece in Teen Vogue about the weird way people are behaving toward Chappell Roan, and what it has to do with our current moment in politics and fan culture. (It was weird to mispronounce Kamala Harris’ name, though.)
Writer Róisín Lanigan’s Guardian op-ed on the Jemima Kirke “I think you guys might be thinking about yourselves too much” meme, therapy culture and privilege.
This thoughtful takedown of Ryan Murphy’s latest show, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, which contains a disturbing—and likely untrue—incest storyline.
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