Taylor Swift got educated on Juneteenth and wants you to be, too
Lisa France byline
By Lisa Respers France, CNN
Updated 7:47 AM ET, Fri June 19, 2020
(CNN)From now on, anyone working for Taylor Swift will have the day off for Juneteenth.
What’s more, Swift wanted to educate her followers about the celebration so the superstar singer posted information on her official social media accounts about the holiday also known as Freedom Day.
June 19 commemorates the day in which slaves in Texas learned slavery had ended — two and a half years after President Abraham Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
On Friday, Swift posted a video of The Root writer Danielle Young explaining the origins of Juneteenth and why it should be a national holiday.
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“Personally, I’ve made the decision to give all of my employees June 19th off in honor of Freedom Day from now on, and to continue to educate myself on the history that brought us to this present moment,” Swift wrote in the caption. “For my family, everything that has transpired recently gives us an opportunity to reflect, listen, and reprogram any part of our lives that hasn’t been loudly and ferociously anti-racist, and to never let privilege lie dormant when it could be used to stand up for what’s right.”
The post came days after Swift took on the issue of Confederate monuments in her adopted home state of Tennessee, writing on social media, “As a Tennessean, it makes me sick that there are monuments standing in our state that celebrate racist historical figures who did evil things. Edward Carmack and Nathan Bedford Forrest were DESPICABLE figures in our state history and should be treated as such.”
Taylor Swift is making waves with the man video and supporting Juneteenth she has more to lose than to gain. This is the moment just like when Frank Sinatra stood up for his friend Sammy Davis Jr. He could not stay in the Hotel he would not be staying in either. She has considerable fan base she is pop and country star for real. She just transcended as an artist and moved a little closer to an activist. She has always just stood on the sideline and protected her brand but no more she has a voice about sexism and racism and it looks good on her. This kind of take me by surprise. She makes it clear she is taking a stand. She has 135 million fans on Instagram she has a real voice. And her having the guts to but up The roots on her feed and teach is amazing.