Lizzo has taken to social media to celebrate a legal victory, as claims of fat-shaming were dismissed from a lawsuit brought against her by three of her former dancers.
In August 2023, Arianna Davis, Crystal Williams and Noelle Rodriguez filed a suit against the singer, but a judge has now dismissed a key portion of the allegations, in which the dancers claimed that Lizzo had fat-shamed them in the workplace.
Although those claims have now been dropped, the larger lawsuit continues, with other allegations including the accusation that Lizzo created a hostile work environment and she engaged in sexual harassment. The incidents are alleged to have taken place between 2021 and 2023.
Lizzo has adamantly denied all of the allegations.
The singer posted a video on her social media on Monday (December 15), showing her standing before a camera as a series of written statements caption the video. “The fat shaming claims against me have been officially dropped by my accusers,” the caption read. “They conceded it had no merit in court.”
“There was no evidence that I fired them because they gained weight,” it continued. “Because it never happened. Now the truth is finally out. They weren’t fired for gaining weight. They were fired for taking a private recording of me without my consent and sending it off to ex employees.”
“I have never fired an employee for gaining weight. I have only encouraged and supported people with bigger bodies and shared my platform with them.”
“This claim has haunted me since the day it came out. It has been devastating to suffer through this in silence but I let my lawyers lead and I’m so grateful for this victory. I am still in a legal battle. I am not settling. I will be fighting every single claim until the truth is out.”
Among the other claims in the suit, the dancers allege that Lizzo bullied Davis into touching a nude performer in a strip club in Amsterdam and asked the dancers to eat fruit from the naked bodies of sex club workers.
In October 2023, Lizzo described the suit as a “fabricated sob story” and filed her own motion asking the court to dismiss it, alleging that the dancers had shown a “pattern of gross misconduct”.
A ruling in January 2024 saw a judge dismiss some other elements of the case, and last December, Lizzo spoke out, saying she “did nothing wrong” and had been “blindsided”, “completely surprised” and “deeply hurt” by the case.
In other news, earlier this month, Lizzo wrote a Substack essay in which she said she thinks everyone should experience being cancelled “at least once”.