Billie Eilish Confronts Body Shaming as She Kicks Off Tour: 'If I Shed the Layers, I Am a Slut'

“Though you've never seen my body, you still judge it and judge me for it," Billie Eilish said during a video interlude

Billie Eilish made a powerful statement about body shaming as she kicked off her world tour on Monday.

The 18-year-old singer, who has said in the past that she purposefully wears baggy clothes so people can’t judge her body, addressed her own experiences in a video interlude during her show at Miami’s American Airlines Arena. In the interlude, which was shared online by concertgoers, Eilish slowly strips down to a bra before sinking down into a black-colored liquid.

“Some people hate what I wear, some people praise it. Some people use it to shame others, some people use it to shame me,” she says in the clip, according to The Guardian, noting that “while I feel your stares, your disapproval or your sighs of relief, if I lived by them, I’d never be able to move.”

“The body I was born with, is it not what you wanted? If what I wear is comfortable, I am not a woman. If I shed the layers, I am a slut,” she adds. “Though you’ve never seen my body, you still judge it and judge me for it. Why?”

While criticizing society for making “assumptions about people based on their size,” Eilish points out that ultimately, the opinions of others have nothing to do with her.

“If I wear more, if I wear less, who decides what that makes me? What that means? Is my value based only on your perception? Or is your opinion of me not my responsibility?” she says.

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Addressing her signature look last year, Eilish said that she wears “big, baggy clothes” to avoid as much body shaming as possible.

“I never want the world to know everything about me,” Eilish said in a Calvin Klein ad. “I mean, that’s why I wear big, baggy clothes. Nobody can have an opinion because they haven’t seen what’s underneath, you know?”

“Nobody can be like, ‘Oh, she’s slim-thick, she’s not slim-thick, she’s got a flat ass, she’s got a fat ass. No one can say any of that, because they don’t know,” she added.

In an interview with V Magazine she went on to clarify that her clothing preferences shouldn’t be taken as a
rebuke of others who choose to wear more form-fitting or revealing outfits.

“It’s a weird thing because I know a lot of what I hear is a positive or people trying to be positive about how I dress; how I am never really out there wearing nothing, or wearing dresses. I’ve heard that. [Even] from my parents, [the] positive [comments] about how I dress have this slut-shaming element,” she explained. “And I can’t [overstate how] strongly I do not appreciate that, at all.”

“I have never ever looked at a girl who feels comfortable in her clothes, body, and skin and thought, ‘Ew, that’s gross, she is showing too much,’ or, ‘I wish people wouldn’t wear that,’ ” she continued. “I have always supported and f—ed with and just loved when a woman or a man or anyone in the world feels comfortable in their skin, their body, to show just whatever they want.”