Lily Allen has a hot take on a controversial term that’s used to describe the child of a famous parent whose own success is believed to be due to their family ties ― a “nepo baby.”
The Smile singer’s thoughts on the term come after it went viral in 2022 on social media when New York magazine highlighted dozens of nepo babies in a story that kicked off discourse across the internet.
During Monday’s episode of her Miss Me podcast, Lily said the term is used in an “infantilising nature” and it’s “something that is almost exclusively used for women”.
“I don’t think I can even really name any male nepo babies,” she said.
Lily, who is the daughter of British actor Keith Allen, argued that her brother Alfie, known for his work on Game Of Thrones, doesn’t face the negative title because he’s a man.
“My brother, for instance, doesn’t get called nepo baby, and I do,” the Brit Award winner singer said.
“I actually don’t really mind the nepotism thing, it’s the ‘baby’ that annoys me. It’s like, I’m 40 years old nearly!”
Lily went on to claim that being slapped with the title disproportionately happens to women in the entertainment industry.
“I feel like a lot of the time over the past 15, 20 years when I’ve been written about, it will always say, ‘Lily Allen, daughter of Keith Allen,’ and I don’t see that happening with boys as often as it does with girls,” she explained.
She also compared being called a nepo baby to getting labeled a “Karen,” a slang word to describe an entitled and sometimes racist white woman.
“Nepo babies, I think it’s quite like ‘Karen,’ in the sense that it’s just a word that is basically used for women who are taking up space, and we’d rather they didn’t, and they should just go away,” the crooner said.
Lily admitted “there’s an element of truth” to people calling her a nepo baby, clarifying, “I grew up in a certain class bracket, I grew up in and amongst people that worked in media, and I don’t think I’ve ever really disputed that”.
Amid the term’s virality in 2022, Lily argued Hollywood isn’t the only place nepo babies exist, writing on X (formerly Twitter): “The nepo babies y’all should be worrying about are the ones working for legal firms, the ones working for banks, and the ones working in politics.”
“If we’re talking about real world consequences and robbing people of opportunity. BUT that’s none of my business,” she added in her December 2022 post at the time.