Leadership Lessons From the VMAs: raceAhead
Taylor Swift got political and Lizzo reminded us that we all deserve to “feel good as hell.”
The 2019 MTV Video Music Awards aired last night at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. And while there was a wonderful and long overdue tribute to the talent the city has produced, one presumes the stars brought their own bottled water.
That said, here are three moments that are worth revisiting in the light of day.
Ten years after Kanye West stepped on her moment during her first VMA acceptance speech, Taylor Swift was not interrupted this year. She opened the show with a performance that included her LGBTQ+ ally-themed song, “You Need To Calm Down,” which also won video of the year.
Surrounded by a diverse squad of dancers and collaborators, she used the win to make a political call to action.
“In this video, several points were made,” Swift said in her acceptance speech. “You voting for this video means that you want a world where we’re all treated equally under the law, regardless of who you love, regardless of how we identify.” The video ends with a link to a petition to sign the Equality Act which now has more than half a million signatures, “more than five times the amount it would need to warrant a response from the White House.” She looked at her watch, in mock exasperation.
Missy Elliott, who, in a more just world would have grand buildings and stadiums named after her, received the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award for her extraordinary work as an avant
If you’re looking for a role model for risk-taking, you can’t do better. For more, check out this Fortune interview on her brainstorm and creative process with Dave Meyers, her longtime video director.
But I’ll end my dispatch with the woman who fully brought the leadership power.
Lizzo nailed her live performance last night, a beautifully produced, choir-backed version of her two hit songs, “Truth Hurts” and “Good As Hell.” It was a joyously unapologetic celebration of curvy bodies, natural hair, dark skin, and radical self-acceptance, all performed behind a big and bouncy balloon booty.
Lest you think you’ve seen this spectacle before, this was no mere upgrade from Sir MixAlot’s own butt-themed tribute. Instead, it was a full-throated defense of the inalienable right to feel good in one’s own skin, unburdened by the need to damage yourself by catering to society’s withering gaze and expectations.
“Let me talk to y’all for a second,” she said mid-performance as she stepped onto a riser to deliver some wisdom. “I’m tired of the bullshit. And I don’t have to know your story to know that you’re tired of the bullshit, too. It’s so hard to love yourself in a world that doesn’t love you back.”
Then, she gave everyone permission to one hundred percent be themselves.
“Feel good as hell because you deserve to feel good as hell.”