Jameela Jamil Defends Demi Lovato, Slams Diet Culture & 'Guilt Free' Terminology

Jameela Jamil is speaking out to defend her friend Demi Lovato amid the controversy over her comments about a beloved frozen yogurt shop in Los Angeles.

The 28-year-old singer called out the business for putting diet offerings on display for customers before they reached the counter. She later apologized for handling the situation the way she did and offered to work with the shop to change the labels.

Jameela put up an Instagram Story with a long statement in which she defended Demi‘s comments and slammed “guilt free” labels on food.

Click inside to read her full statement…

“Ok, I want to try to avoid making the story bigger than it already is. But if an eating disorder advocate says she sees products that are positioned as guilt free, and it is potentially triggering, that doesn’t mean she’s too stupid to remember that diabetics exist. It just means that we need to change the marketing of products that are for people’s medical needs,” Jameela said.

She continued, “That’s all @ddlovato was asking for. It doesn’t make her a monster. It doesn’t mean she disregards people’s illnesses. She’s just one of few celebrities reminding us to look out for mental illness. Guilt free is diet culture terminology. We need to stop using that fucking term. We are so lucky to even have food. What in the name of shit and hell is there to feel guilty about. That’s a term of shame. Orthorexia is easy to slip into and is a F–KING nightmare to crawl out of. I think it’s good to keep raising awareness on this matter until eating disorder rhetoric is OUT of our normalized mainstream culture. We say words like this all the time. Electing foods for virtue or sin. Cheat, guilty, naughty, bad, unhealthy… etc. all problematic terminology.”

Demi reposted the message and added, “THANK YOU QUEEN. LITERALLY SO GRATEFUL YOU GET ME AND THAT I CAN CALL YOU A CLOSE FRIEND. I LOVE YOU.”

In a second post, Jameela added, “But what I was mostly curious about is watching people rush to deliberately misunderstand her intention and stance, and frame her as ignorant and careless, and inherently bad. Pile ons of mockery of the people who are constantly trying to help… are problematic in ways we don’t consider. You’re not just discouraging the person in question from making themselves vulnerable in order to help others, you’re discouraging future people from doing the same. From risking the pile on in their pursuit of trying to help others.”

“Unless you are also constantly trying to help and advocate for other people, I don’t think it’s a great move of character to pile onto those who do,” Jameela continued. “Is your criticism constructive? Or are you just clowning someone? What’s you’re actual objective? If something has already been said by 1,000,000 people… do you need to also say it? What have you done to help others today? Did you use your time and energy to deconstruct diet culture? Or any other form of oppression? We do this almost exclusively to women who try to help others. We contribute to the silence and silencing of all women when we go THIS hard (people mocking her was the number 1 trending topic on Twitter all day…rather than lawmakers taking away trans rights, healthcare…rather than talking about gun laws…) Just please think about the bigger picture. It’s absolutely important to push for accountability from those in power who make mistakes, but what I’m seeing online is mostly not that. It’s just mockery and cruelty, and maligning of a woman’s character who is navigating unchartered territory of being super famous, super young, super outspoken, super honest and vulnerable and super fragile and strong at the same time.”

Piers Morgan is one of the people who spoke out against Demi and last month, Jameela said she almost killed herself because of him.