Chrissy Teigen’s tweet about John Legend’s Billboard appearance calls out the inherent sexism in mom-shaming

The internet is beside themselves with Chrissy Teigen’s “hilarious digs” at John Legend, who left his wife’s side to perform at the 2018 Billboard Music Awards on Sunday, May 20th, 2018. Teigen live-tweeted the BBMAs and joked about needing Legend to get home in time for the dinner. She also blasted him because Luna didn’t seem that impressed with her dad’s performance (more on that later), but hidden among the jokes and roasts was a profound commentary on the culture of mommy-shaming. Yas, Chrissy.

Teigen gave birth to their son Miles Theodore literally days ago, and stayed at home while Legend headed to Las Vegas to perform at the BBMAs (spoiler: nothing much was made of his going). Imagine if the roles were reversed, though? If Teigen attended a red carpet event just days after the birth of her child, her Instagram would be a full-on flame war with “Wow, where is your kid?” and “Who is taking care of your child?” comments. Mommy-shamers love to attack new moms for doing literally anything without their baby.

Teigen threw up a sarcastic tweet while she watched her husband do red carpet interviews and, yes, it was funny  and totally roasted John Legend, but it was also way real.

"Wow didn’t u just have a baby John smh go take care of it !!!!!! disgusting," Teigen tweeted.

This razor-sharp satire was buried amongst her jokey tweets about Luna and the short ribs she made for dinner — lumped in as just another goofy Teigen tweet.

Teigen has been the victim of mommy-shaming in the past for doing exactly what Legend did last night, aka going somewhere without his child. In 2016, a week after Teigen gave birth to Luna, she and John were criticized for going out to dinner. Yes, really. Even though they both went out to eat, it was only Teigen who was branded as a bad parent for having the audacity to leave her house without her newborn. Legend escaped the debacle unscathed.

https://twitter.com/udfredirect/status/724290037290926080

"We needed a break, we needed to go enjoy each other's company and be out," Teigen told Good Morning America after the 2016 date-night backlash. "I used to read mommy blogs like crazy so I knew mom shaming was a thing, but I didn’t think it would come from going to dinner. That wasn't something that I thought would happen."

Teigen’s friend Kim Kardashian recently had to explain herself in a People.com article when she went to Tokyo, Japan shortly after the birth of her daughter Chicago, almost to pre-empt the natural backlash she would receive for “leaving her baby.”

So yeah, if fathers can scoot off to Vegas two days after the birth of their child with zero fanfare, then why are mothers burned at the stake for doing literally anything after they give birth? Let’s topple the double standard.