During the Jan. 25 episode of "Hot Topic" segment of her "The Wendy Williams Show," the morning talk show host drew netizens' ire after defending singer R. Kelly and then later on claiming she's "sick of" the #MeToo movement.
Netizens took to Twitter their anger after Williams said she is tired of the #MeToo movement — a popular online movement started by Tarana Burke that encourages women who had been victims of sexual abuse to speak up. This statement was made after she claimed that the victims of sexual abuse allegations against "I Believe I Can Fly" singer R. Kelly do not qualify as part of the #MeToo movement.
Williams started her segment talking about the grassroot campaign #MuteRKelly. The campaign has been specifically created for victims of Kelly with the aim of canceling his upcoming concerts and consequently, erasing him from the music industry. Kelly has been involved in sexual abuse scandals (with many of them involving underaged girls) for the most part of his music career, with the latest being about the sex cult he supposedly runs, according to an investigative story in Buzzfeed in July last year.
"So there's a grassroot movement to remove R. Kelly's music...or remove R. Kelly from the music industry forever," she said, adding, "What is this 10 years too late? Really?"
She, later on, added that #MuteRKelly is not going to work. "Black people aren't really good at protesting. Not since the King march...it's not going to work," she further claimed.
Williams also talked about Kelly's previous marriage with his former protégé, Aaliyah, whom he had married at the age of 15. She said, "R. Kelly wasn't a 'Me Too.' Aaliyah voluntarily married him when she was 15 years old. Her parents voluntarily let her do it." Contrary to what she said, however, Rolling Stones, published an article stating that Kelly and Aaliyah lied about her age in the marriage certificate and that her parents were not aware of them doing so.
She continued to talk about Kelly's sex tape with a minor, defending the singer in the process. She said that the underage girl in the video "let it go down." Not long after, she remarked that Kelly's underage victims and their parents are to blame for why the sexual abuses they are alleging him of happened.
Williams ended her discussion by saying, "I'm sick of this #MeToo movement...I love that people are speaking up for the first time and coming out and everything but now it's got...I look at all men like, 'You're a #MeToo.' All of 'em, all of 'em, which is not fair."
