Very few would argue against the lickability of donuts: with such a panoply of flavors and glazes, they are an undeniably seductive snack — and a recently leaked video, seemingly of Ariana Grande surreptitiously licking donuts (that weren’t rightfully hers!) in a shop corroborates this notion. But was such a gesture actually a win for donuts, or, as the Right would hilariously have it, a subtle attack on the pastry as a synecdoche for America, which she also stated in the video that she “hates?” And so the silliest news story of the week actually seems to be getting the pop star in some trouble, while simultaneously exposing the franticness of the Right to condemn anyone who seems “unpatriotic.”
The Associated Press reports that police in Lake Elsinore (where the incident took place), alongside Riverside County public health officials, are now investigating the video — which was originally posted on TMZ. The cashier who was on duty at the time has stated that Grande didn’t pay for the saliva-besmirched donuts in question; she told the AP that Grande “was really rude.”
The Right is especially upset because of the aforementioned prelude to the donut-licking, in which Grande told the friend she was with, “I hate America.” To Fox & Friends (which airs on Fox News), for example, this seemingly suggested that the whole incident was a micro-attack on patriotism via the defiling of the patriotically diabetes-inducing pastry.
Since the incident went public, Grande released an apology via BuzzFeed, stating:
I am EXTREMELY proud to be an American and I’ve always made it clear that I love my country. What I said in a private moment with my friend, who was buying the donuts, was taken out of context and I am sorry for not using more discretion with my choice of words.
She went on to discuss childhood obesity in America:
I sometimes get upset by how freely we as Americans eat and consume things without giving any thought to the consequences that it has on our health and society as a whole. The fact that the United States has the highest child obesity rate in the world frustrates me. We need to do more to educate ourselves and our children about the dangers of overeating and the poison that we put into our bodies. We need to demand more from our food industry.
In perhaps the funniest and saddest thing you’ll see all day, Fox News shared a video clip from Fox & Friends labeled “Why are young Americans not as patriotic?” which, with utmost gravity, tries to scrutinize the act and pinpoint what they see as its nefarious origins. It reaches its ridiculous apotheosis when they bring American soldier/host of the hunting show Limitless with Theresa Vail — Theresa Vail — in to comment, and she goes on to blame Obama for, let’s recall, a pop star licking donuts.
Fox & Friends:
Theresa, how could someone who grows up in Florida, was a childhood star, is now a popstar/actress/voiceover person, her life is great, walk into a donut shop — the donuts didn’t come to her! — and then comment about America, and yet you grew up in America, have a totally different vide. How does that happen?!
Theresa Vail:
I can speculate…for the past 6 or 7 years, and that’s a good chunk of a millennial’s adult lifetime, we’ve had a president who doesn’t believe in American exceptionalism, he doesn’t speak up for American values or the foundation that this country was built on, so can you blame millennials for their modicum of patriotism when for the majority of our adult lifetime, we haven’t witnessed anything to make us think differently.
Fox & Friends:
That’s a point I hadn’t thought about…