Christine and the Queens suggested that “the queer aesthetic” is being used as a marketing strategy as she revealed that she feels “conflicted” by Taylor Swift’s newfound LGBTQ advocacy.
Swift’s recent video for single You Need To Calm Down featured cameos from LGBTQ celebrities and encouraged viewers to sign a petition urging the US Senate to support the Equality act.
However, some critics claimed that the singer was taking advantage of the gay rights movement.
Discussing celebrity advocacy of LGBTQ issues in a new interview with Cosmopolitan, Christine, 31, said: “I’m conflicted. I guess somewhere, young gay men might watch that Taylor Swift video and feel a sense of relief.
“Five years on [since Christine entered the industry] and you can tell that being queer has been glossed out as this super-fancy accessory. You can tell that the queer aesthetic is being used to sell things.
“The mainstream needs that life because it’s so vibrant. But I think the core of the queer aesthetic cannot be sold.”
The star, real name Heloise Letissier, said that coming out as pansexual to the French media in 2014 felt like “a detonation.”
“When your sexuality is not the norm, you have to find words to express it,” she added.
“Sometimes I was made to feel dirty, or like it was obscene. It’s just a sexual orientation - there’s nothing perverse about that. Just being young, sexually active and proud of your sexuality is a problem for women.”
The singer said that her musical alter ego was “born out of feeling frustrated that people would say no to me because I was a woman. She was this anger.
“Christine was a way of escaping that.”
The November issue of Cosmopolitan is on sale from October 2.
