Amala Ekpunobi
Pop Star Charli XCX Endorses Kamala Harris
This episode is brought to you by Snapple, wanna know another Snapple fact? The first hot air balloon passengers were a sheep, a duck, and a rooster. Ridiculous! Check out Snapple.com to find ridiculously flavored Snapple near you. Vice President Kamala Harris is receiving endorsement after endorsement in the wake of the news that Joe Biden will no longer be running for re-election. And today we're going to be talking about a somewhat unlikely endorsement coming from none other than English pop icon Charlie XCX. It's bridging generational divides, it's getting people talking about pop music and politics, and most importantly, people are asking, what does it mean to be brat? If you're confused, I'll explain it, let's talk about it. Guys, before we get into today's video, please like and subscribe. I have a lot of explaining to do in today's video. As I said, this is creating generational conversations, and they're all surrounding a pop star by the name Charlie XCX and Kamala Harris. As I said, Kamala Harris is now the front runner as far as who's going to be the Democratic nominee in this next presidential election, and with that, people are throwing out their endorsements. If you're unfamiliar with who Charlie XCX is, I'll show you her. This is what she looks like, and she's just come out with an album titled Brat. They are saying it's the album of the summer, some even saying it is the album of the year, and she's in the pop scene, kind of like electro dance pop, I guess is how I would characterize it. You guys can correct me on that if I'm wrong. I've listened to Brat many times over. I'll say first and foremost, it is a fantastic album, especially if you love to dance. There are not many skip songs on this album for me. It's been receiving great reviews. It is super popular, of course, among Gen Z and Gen Alpha. I feel as though as an artist, Charlie XCX has really stepped into herself on this one, and has created such an iconic set of sound. It's really a dynamic album. It's fun, it's introspective, it's honest, it's cutting. There are so many cool things about this album, and I feel like artists in today's time have really lost sight of the creation of an album as like a total piece of work. We're in this sort of singles culture right now, especially in pop music, where artists are just throwing out single after single after single, and nobody's thinking about how these songs work together as a tracklist and flow into one another, and Charlie XCX dominates it here. Okay, let me stop ranting on that and actually get into what we're talking about today. Now, as much as this album agrees with me, and I agree with it, I don't so much agree with her endorsement of Kamala Harris, but that's okay. Let's talk about it. I am capable of separating art from artists, in fact, I do it all the time. If I were to distance myself from artists that I disagreed with politically, I'd probably never listen to or see a piece of art in my lifetime, and artistry does sort of lend itself to leftism and liberalism, and we can talk about why that is maybe a little bit down the line in this video. But first, let's unpack her endorsement. Charlie XCX tweeted out three words, Kamala is brat. These three words shook the world for some reason. People couldn't believe this. It got 300,000 likes on Twitter, over 300,000, over 50,000 retweets. Many people are asking ourselves, what does it mean to be brat? Others were already on board and understand what it means and that it is tantamount to an endorsement. For those of you who don't get it, of course, this is a positive thing. It's positive to be brat. Charlie XCX just released that iconic album, Brat, in early June, and she's created a cultural moment surrounding the album. It's really taken on a life of its own as far as branding and marketing, and she's done a really dynamic marketing campaign that has really asked people to take ownership of this word brat. I know I'm explaining this as if it's some highbrow concept. But essentially, brat is a culture, and people are living there brat summers right now. You'll often hear brat summer in reference to Charlie XCX, and what it means to lead a brat summer or to be brat, I don't know, let's turn to some of the thing pieces. I can give my own definition, but I want to stick to the brat's tax here. This glamour article says it's 2024, and it seems we're all ready for a brat summer, but you might be wondering what even is brat summer. To answer a few questions up front, the location, a grungy, sticky club, of course, the color palette, a sickening slime green, the smell in the air, probably Marlboro lights, fries and sweat. Does that help you understand what it means to be brat? If not, okay, we're, again, bridging generational divides. This is being talked about on CNN. That's how big this endorsement is. Charlie XCX is even listed. I'll show this to you here. She is listed as an official endorsement on Kamala Harris' Wikipedia page for campaign endorsements. There she is at the bottom, English pop musician. Yeah. So you're right in there, if you don't understand this, with a ton of other people, especially people from other generations who are not familiar with what even a brat summer is. As I said, this was covered on CNN. Let's let them try to explain what brat is to you. For the record, I always tipped off about this, what I'm about to share with our voters, our viewers rather, by my 16-year-old daughter, who is an actual member of Gen C. Kamala Harris appears to be leaning into this. The singer, Charlie XCX, tweeted last night, "Kamala is brat," and this is in reference to her album. It's called Brat. Her Kamala HQ Twitter page with the same aesthetic of the album, it's another Gen C word aesthetic. It's even becoming a trend on TikTok. Just special Gen C correspondent Jamie Gail, what can you tell us about that? So first of all, just for my producer Elizabeth Stewart, who will spit out her coffee as I say this, I am supposed to say that's brat. And for those who don't or not in the know the way I am, that is a cool thing. It has a color. chartreuse is the color, and Kamala Harris has adopted that for whatever social media page that is. But I have brought some notes because I knew you would want a definition. Okay, here we go. Not the TikTok edit. Charlie XCX, who I do know, quote brat, "You're just that girl who is a little messy and likes to party and maybe says some dumb things sometimes," end quote. So it's the idea that... Oh my gosh, you know what, that actually might describe Kamala Harris almost to a tea. And I love this sort of stiff way in which the news reporter is reading this. You're just that girl, you know, it's messy. You like to party. That's not what Charlie XCX sounds like, but she is English, so close enough. We're all kind of brat, and Vice President Harris is brat. Well, I don't know if you will aspire to be brat, you don't just become brat. Oh, okay. You don't just become brat. I will aspire to be brat. I will aspire. But I mean, the point is that she is, whether it's her or some very clever people who work for her, going right for them in the language of their own that apparently nobody at this table speaks. Oh, another generation. Maybe this is your generation. She's going to... I'm going to close this. She's her millennial. Take it easy. So you tell me, is this right, she's going to own it. She's going to own it. Own it. Wow. Wow. Okay. So there you go. They're CNN trying to figure out what brat means, and they did it all right job. Just know that it means that Charlie XCX thinks that Kamala Harris is cool, and she is to be supported, I guess what this is really pointed out for me is that brat can take on so many different forms, and forms that I would have not have understood, because I would have never have associated Kamala Harris with brat. Even knowing Charlie's background, her political ideas, even so, you know, I could think of a lot of other left-leaning people who are a lot more brat than Kamala Harris would be considered to be in my viewpoint through my world of view, but I digress. Who am I? I didn't coin the term she did. She says it's brat, I guess it's brat, and Kamala Harris and her campaign team, I should say, which is probably made up of quite a few Gen Z aides. They are jumping on this. Kamala Harris has followed Charlie XCX back on Instagram and Twitter to really emphasize the fact that she knows who Charlie XCX is. She knows what it means to be having a brat summer, and of course, as they said on CNN, they rebranded their social media page for the headquarters. I will say, I can bet probably $10,000 right now, Kamala Harris had no idea who Charlie XCX was, or what brat is before getting this tweet and before her team jumped on it. She might not even to this day know who Charlie XCX is, but it is very smart on her end of the campaign to at least pretend and pander towards Gen Z in this way, because we live in a malleable moment where either fortunately or unfortunately, however you want to view it, these people with platforms have a lot of influence over young people. I view it in a more unfortunate sense for obvious reasons. I think our political opinions, while they are often influenced by other people, should really come from ourselves in deep exploration and introspection, but who's to say that people don't get that from art and artists? I would just always recommend whoever you are, whatever side of the political spectrum you're on, that you don't turn to specific artists, idols, icons to tell you what to think and feel. And I am one on this channel who will talk about celebrities who give out conservative endorsements, although that is few and far between for many reasons, one because a lot of artists just don't feel that way, another because a lot of artists that do have to be quite quiet about it. They can whisper in the direction of conservatism and shouts in the direction of liberalism and leftism, but I don't say that we turn to those celebrities to tell us what to think and feel. They just happen to have said something that I agree with and I will cheer it on, especially in a moment where it's unfortunately become a brave thing to say things that are dissident to the current cultural idea of what it means to be a good person, what it means to be politically enlightened. But yeah, I don't know. It makes sense. You build this life, you create art, you gain a platform and in Charlie XCX's case, she has millions and millions of followers, I don't know somebody who wouldn't use that platform to push their own personal message, whatever that personal message may be. For Charlie XCX, it happens to be an endorsement of Kamala Harris, which is really interesting because she's an English artist and I don't know how deep her roots are set within the US political system or why she felt so strongly about what's happening in the US political system. I'd love to hear more than just the three words Kamala is brat and I'd love for her to expand on that idea because as far as I know, she hasn't spoken out too openly about all the different elections that have been taking place in the UK and in regard to the EU in general and all these different things and you would feel as though she'd be more deeply impacted by those than anything happening here in the US. But with artistry in the music industry, maybe she spends a lot of time here in the US and she has a lot of US fans, so maybe that makes her feel as though she is more deeply impacted by what takes place here. I don't know, in artistry it makes sense, I think specifically with like music and entertainment, their personalities lend well to a high openness to experience. They are very emotional typically, they sort of lean towards a utopic view of the world or at least of what the world could be and I think all of those personality characteristics lend themselves to believing in leftism and somewhat liberal ideas. You know, I am of the thought that leftism has largely left liberalism in the dust and has become its whole new thing and those things are separate, but I could see Charlie XCX having a mix of both liberal and leftist views up in here. So when I see artists who espouse these opinions, it is not at all surprising to me. In fact it is the norm, I would love to hear from some artists who don't agree with this and I would love to hear why, I have a feeling that's not going to happen though, because it's frowned upon, it's a no-no to be supporting somebody like Donald Trump or not even that just be looking into the realm of conservative beliefs and conservative views. Which is so funny, because I see clips of Donald Trump and come to think of it, if I'm thinking of who's brat, I'm really thinking Donald Trump and that's not necessarily an endorsement of all of his ideas or to say that Charlie XCX should endorse his ideas. But hold up, let me pull up a clip. Watch this clip of Trump and tell me you're not thinking. You're not thinking brat. The problem with Ron DeSang Temonius is that he needs a personality transplant and those are not yet available. Almost all congressmen and women that served with him and knew him well supported me. Some of them, please, you're telling me that's not brat. It's not giving mean girls on the album. Please. Anyways, you look into the Charlie XCX lyrics, you know, should we do a little key? Should we have a little line? You know, she's a party girl. At least Hunter Biden. That's brat. And he's left. He's left adjacent. Let me stop. I'm not going to go ahead and give my theories on who I think is brat. Charlie XCX made up the term she, therefore, I think is the arbiter at this point of the definition and who gets to be defined as brat. And she's chosen Kamala Harris. I disagree with it for many reasons. I disagree with what that means as far as policy, how that affects our country. But at the end of the day, who cares? You know, this is celebrity. This is what happens. This is happen time and time again and will continue to happen time and time again. And as far as the demographic, the Charlie XCX influences, we're talking about young women in particular, maybe a few young men mixed in there. She's really prominent within the LGBTQ plus community. All of these communities or demographics mentioned are already moving in the direction of Kamala Harris. You know, that this really tipped to the scale in either direction, her coming out with this endorsement. And yeah, you know, she stated her opinion out loud and opinion that if you listen to her music or if you listen to her speak, you would have guessed she already had. So there is no surprise here. I'll continue to listen to brat is a good album and I can separate art from artists. I'd love to see some artists here and there that share my political views and I'd love to know why and how they got there and how it is to be within the industry that at least from my view has an ideology and a line that needs to be told. How do they deal with that? Let me know, guys, if one of you out there exists and for some reason is watching a video about Charlie XCX is brat endorsement of Kamala Harris, come out of the closet and let us know your political beliefs, please let me stop guys. Thank you so much for watching and I will see you next time. If you liked this video, like, subscribe, click the notification bell to be notified every single time I post a video for you guys, which is every day I thought I was having a brat summer and through the course of this video, I've recognized that while I thought I knew what that meant, I don't know what that means. If Kamala Harris is brat, can I be brat at the same time? I don't know how Charlie XCX feels about people who disagree with her politically. Knowing the trend of things is probably not good, but I don't like to think about that too much. Let me shut up, okay, bye guys. (upbeat music)
Pop star Charli XCX makes waves with a three word endorsement of Kamala Harris for President. “Kamala IS brat”, she posted on X in the wake of the news that Joe Biden would not be running for reelection. What does this mean? Let’s talk about it.