While I do not live under a rock, I sometimes feel like I do when people talk about some famous people I have never even heard of. The same applies to Rachel Hollis. But after her recent TikTok rant that she also posted on her IG account (and just deleted today), pretty much everyone and their grandmother must have heard about her.
Let me summarize real quick what I learned about her from some quick internet research:
Rachel Hollis is a mom of 4 kids who was married to businessman Dave Hollis until 2020. She is a mompreneur, author, MLM coach, motivational speaker, and influencer. She amassed a huge following on social media especially after posting a relatable picture of her postpartum body. In the past, she has been criticized for plagiarizing.
The infamous now-deleted rant:
The infamous non-deleted non-apology:
If you have read my article about Hilaria Baldwin, you already know I’m not a fan of the entire internet ganging up on a person after they did something wrong. I usually tend to feel like I have to defend these people because after all, we are all human. And humans make mistakes. Being in the public eye makes it even more difficult as everyone watches your every step. However, Rachel’s condescending video and followed-up non-apology left me scratching my head a bit. Her annoying delivery was not the only thing wrong with this video. Instead of owning up to her mistake, she made it worse by posting a terrible apology on her social media five days later.
Here are some of my issues with this:
- Housecleaners are hard workers and deserve respect
I do not take any issue at all with her having someone clean her house. As a matter of fact, we also have a wonderful woman coming to our house. We appreciate all her hard work so much and she has become like family. Why did Rachel Hollis feel the need to diminish her housekeeper’s work by repeatedly saying that “she cleans toilets?” It is just very condescending and in poor taste!
2. Don’t conflate income with hard work! They are not the same.
As mentioned above, she makes some statements that make it sound like she works much harder than most people, and that is why she is more successful than they are. Amongst other things, she mentions that she is one of the few people who wake up a 4 am every morning. Honey, I hate to break it to you but I know plenty of women who do that simply to make ends meet and without bragging about it. There are tons of single moms out there without any support who do this on a daily basis. As a matter of fact, my wonderful, above-mentioned cleaning lady is up and running at 5 a.m. every day hustling to take care of her family and send money back home to her family in her home country. All while having a smile on her face and never acting as if she works harder than others. Maybe it’s time to take a piece of that humble pie. You live a privileged life! Waking up at 4 a.m. to go to the gym does NOT make you the hardest worker in the room Which brings me to the next point.
3. PSA: Women who are with rich dudes, stop calling other women poor!
So, let’s address the elephant in the room. Rachel married a Disney executive at the age of 21! He helped her open her first business(es). From there on, she started her career as an author, motivational speaker, and blogger. It is much easier to start these types of careers when you have a husband paying for all the bills. Most women I know do it while working full-time at a company AND raising kids because they simply do not have the luxury. I have noticed this several times that women who are together with rich dudes tend to look down on less affluent women. Girl, you need to take a seat and chill. You would not be where you are without the financial support of your now-ex-husband.
4. Bragging about being unrelatable
Ok, her uncomfortable rambling on how she does not want to be relatable is cringe-worthy as is. But what makes it so hypocritical, is that her entire career on built on being relatable. Her breakthrough moment on social media was when she posted a picture of her “mom bod” including stretch marks. People liked that down-to-earth attitude and she gained a following that she was able to sell her books and MLM products to.
5. The comparison to great women in history
I think we can all agree that her caption was even worse than the video. She lists some of the greatest women in history such as Harriet Tubman, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Malala Yousafzai who were all “unrelatable AF” just like her. No! Simply no to an influencer comparing herself to an abolitionist who freed slaves. Simply the no-est No there ever was.
6. Late non-apology followed by a second attempt at an apology
She did not address the serious backlash she got after this video until 5 days after posting it. She issued what must have been the worst apology ever on her IG which read something to the extent: Sorry you guys felt that way but I still do not understand what was wrong about my video and it’s my team’s fault I let so much time pass. Obviously, this only made the crowds furious so she just issued another apology today and also finally deleting that horrific post. Scroll below to read it.
Since any apology is better than none, I’ll give her some credit for that. But words are very powerful and she has hurt a lot of people with what she said. Since I could not live with myself if I would end a post only bashing a person without saying anything positive, I want to add something. I do commend her for her career, her success, and raising four children which is not easy at all. But the way she talked about it in such an arrogant, condescending manner was just plain offensive. I hope she considers using her words more carefully in the future and using her platforms to lift others up instead of putting them down.