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TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney and the Ulta beauty logo

Andrea Austria / Media Matters

#BoycottUlta campaign ignites over anti-trans vitriol toward TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney

The transfemme TikTok darling joined genderfluid hairstylist David Lopez in Ulta’s “The Beauty Of…” series for an episode on “Girlhood,” and the transphobes aren’t happy

Special Programs LGBTQ

Written by Vesper Henry

Research contributions from Mia Gingerich

Published 10/20/22 1:17 PM EDT

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Since coming out as a trans woman in March, social media influencer Dylan Mulvaney has amassed a following of over 8 million people on TikTok who join her as she shares her transition journey day by day. On October 13, Mulvaney joined genderfluid hairstylist and host David Lopez on Ulta Beauty’s YouTube series “The Beauty Of…” for an episode on “Girlhood,” triggering reactionary outrage that culminated in the hashtag #BoycottUlta trending on Twitter.

Each episode in the series is designed to shed light on people who fall outside the cultural norm of beauty standards (previous episodes include “The Beauty Of… Fatness with Virgie Tovar”). The episode with Mulvaney discussed her gender identity and recent experience transitioning throughout the 50-minute interview.

Mulvaney’s comments about her ability to one day be a mother, as well as the Ulta Twitter account’s caption “Trans girls can do it all,” drew the ire of right-wing pundits and transphobic Twitter users, including Blaze Media podcast host Allie Beth Stuckey.

Stuckey even made an entire podcast episode about it afterwards. 

And Turning Point USA contributor Lauren Chen suggested a woman being happy with herself is “creepy,” if that woman is trans.

Although Ulta hid and turned off comments on the episode in the face of digital harassment, the company followed up with a two-part Twitter post on October 16 defending both the episode and the premise of its series.

The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh, who has faced recent criticism for comments defending teenage pregnancy and marriage, attacked the company for its response.

Stuckey got another word in, calling the episode “lunacy.”

Other right-wingers continued doubling down in attacking Mulvaney’s interview.

Cassandra MacDonald, editor-in-chief of Timcast News and longtime alt-right troll, suggested that trans identities are “the gender equivalent of black face.”

Her boss, conservative YouTuber Tim Pool, said the episode with Mulvaney was “the definition of mansplaining.”

The outrage wasn’t contained to just Twitter, however, as right-wing media outlets also piled on.

Fox & Friends as well as Stuckey’s employer, TheBlaze, both recycled the “biological men” rhetoric against Mulvaney and Lopez. PJ Media diminished the two people discussing their gender identities to “a weird sexual fetish that has nothing to do with being female,” and The Daily Caller labeled the episode an “epic fail.”

Video file

Citation From the October 17, 2022, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends First

CARLEY SHIMKUS (CO-HOST): Ulta Beauty facing outrage and calls for a boycott after releasing a clip of two biological men discussing the virtues of girlhood.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

DYLAN MULVANEY: I want to have a family, I want to be a mom one day, and I absolutely can. And that's why the narrative still has a long way to go.

(VIDEO ENDS)

SHIMKUS: The beauty company says it wanted to feature women who come in all shapes and sizes. Critics however are calling for a boycott, saying it was a slap in the face to womanhood.

This isn’t the first time Mulvaney has been targeted by conservative vitriol. Just last month, OAN host Allison Steinberg misgendered and hurled slurs at Mulvaney on Instagram, inciting an online harassment campaign that Meta failed to curtail.

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