celebrity

Em Rata has finally spoken out about that Celeste Barber drama.

Emily Ratajkowski addressed her highly publicised drama with Australian comedian Celeste Barber on her podcast High Low With EmRata this week. 

In case you missed it, Celeste Barber publicly revealed she was blocked on Instagram by the supermodel after she posted a video back in 2021 mimicking Em Rata's poses advertising her swimwear line. 

It wasn't the first time that Celeste Barber, who is well-known for using her social media channels to poke fun at influencers and beauty standards, had targeted Em Rata's posts directly. But in this case, the caption that the comedian used sparked a huge amount of backlash. 

She wrote: "We are sick of you objectifying our bodies. Also, here's my ass." 

ADVERTISEMENT

The Wellmania star received an onslaught of criticism for using a caption that many social media users considered tone-deaf. 

“em rata getting paid to do a lingerie modeling job that she consents to, vs em rata getting sexually harassed and assaulted at work & speaking out about it— do you not see how these are different??? Yikes,” one comment read. 

Another commenter replied: "This captions reeks of people who tell women 'what did they expect' when they go out in a short skirt and get sexually assaulted... please check your internalised misogyny..."

ADVERTISEMENT

Celeste Barber responded to the backlash during an interview with Fitzy and Wippa by saying “'I don’t think Emily is a fan. That’s okay, she’s allowed to not love it”.

Em Rata was questioned on High Low by a Kiwi listener whether her take has changed in hindsight since the incident. 

“This whole drama with Celeste has been blown out of proportion... In general, I find her to be really funny."

“But, [the] message I was trying to send to her was 'I just don’t want you to do this anymore to me.'"

Listen to Mamamia Out Loud discuss Emily Ratajkowski's career below. 

Em Rata went on to explain on the podcast: “I want to be able to do my thing, whether that be writing about my terrifying experiences in an industry that doesn’t protect women and young girls and femme presenting people while also having a bathing suit line.”

She then gave context around the timing of the incident, referencing that her first essay Buying My Body Back, in which she speaks on others using her image for profit without her consent, had only just been published by New York Magazine. 

“I was like, I’m not giving her my consent for this joke anymore. It just landed at a really specific time for me."

Em Rata stressed she had no bad feelings towards Barber personally, but addressed the larger issue of general misogyny towards female influencers. 

ADVERTISEMENT

She said that it's important to be able to laugh at yourself but it's too easy to make fun of people who are putting their bodies on display and the humour around it can be inherently misogynistic. 

“We really love to pick on female influencers, like they are considered the trash, lamest, most cringe, most embarrassing people on the planet," she said. 

“I fundamentally find that to be sexist. Yeah, no shit women want to be influencers, it’s one of the ways that women have learned to be successful and make money. They’re hustling”. 

Images supplied by Getty. 

Love watching TV and movies? Take our survey now to go in the running to win a $100 gift voucher.