Lana Del Rey Says She’s Ditching the American Flag Because of Trump
Lana Del Rey's new Lust for Life will be decidedly less patriotic than fans might have anticipated it would be — the singer says in a new interview with Salon that she's ditched allusions to the American flag in light of Donald Trump's election to office.
Del Rey, whose latest album drops today (July 21), says that while she once flashed the stars and stripes wherever she could, the country's shifting political tides have made her reticent to declare herself a patriot.
“It’s certainly uncomfortable. I definitely changed my visuals on my tour videos," she said. "I’m not going to have the American flag waving while I’m singing “Born to Die.' It’s not going to happen. I’d rather have static. It’s a transitional period, and I’m super aware of that. I think it would be inappropriate to be in France with an American flag. It would feel weird to me now — it didn’t feel weird in 2013.”
Del Rey added that — independently of her celebrity — she's noticed a change in her day-to-day life.
“I feel less safe than I did when Obama was president,” she said. “When you have a leader at the top of the pyramid who is casually being loud and funny about things like that, it’s brought up character defects in people who already have the propensity to be violent towards women. I saw it right away in L.A. Walking down the street, people would just say things to you that I had never heard.”
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