With the current state of media and our habits as contemporary consumers, it’s become easier than ever for people of all backgrounds to kickstart careers as political “commentators.” Consider Tomi Lahren, whose signature blonde locks and aggressive style of speaking have helped make her one of the biggest conservative figures on Facebook. In 2017, just three years after posting her first video, Lahren was hired as a regular contributor to Fox News. Beginning in the latter part of that same year, Candace Owens, a fellow conservative star with similar attention-grabbing tactics, would begin to share pro-Trump content online. Today, the two are Republican Barbie contemporaries, albeit one obvious difference, being that Owens is Black in a space where the overwhelming majority is White. Beyond that, Owens has made her fair share of public comments against Black-centered movements, slamming the Juneteenth holiday for pushing “perpetual victim mentality,” and lambasting the late George Floyd for having been a felon before his death.

The reality of Candace Owens’ alarming views on racism, when she herself is a Black woman, have made her the butt of repeated online ridicule. African-American satire website “The Root“ has joked that she is in the “Sunken Place,” a reference to the unsuspecting Black enslavement storyline of the 2017 film “Get Out,” and there is also a recurring bit amongst Twitter users that Owens’ husband is a closeted homosexual that is cheating on her with her own brother. The latter quip was given significant attention when it was perpetuated during a feud with Owens by rapper Cardi B, who boasts over 19 million followers on the platform. Despite Cardi’s tweets criticizing Owens for attacking her 2021 Grammy performance with Megan Thee Stallion, racking up hundreds of thousands of likes and reposts, no fans on either side can deny that this “beef” heavily promoted Candace Owens and the network she represents, the Ben Shapiro-founded “Daily Wire.”

This is especially painful to realize when you consider that Candace Owens is kind of a fraud, and likely her sole purpose for even being a figure in the conservative world is to catch a payday. It appears to be little-known that in 2015, a mere two years before her viral “coming out” as a conservative, Owens was the CEO of and contributor to a blog called Degree180, in which she personally authored a scathing blog post criticizing the Republican Party. The same website also contained jokes about the size of Donald Trump’s genitals, as well as several other articles critiquing the then-candidate. Just months after the closure of this failed venture, Owens came back on the scene with an ideological overhaul, publicly signaling endless praise for Donald Trump and relentlessly attacking prominent left-wing figures, after which her ascent to public recognition began. For someone who’s built a multimillion-dollar business out of adapting her ideology to fit lucrative Internet niches, every engagement with posts related to her, even ones that are against her, is like money deposited right into Owens’ bank account.

As an avid reality TV watcher who is frequently in the know about celebrity and Internet personality feuds, I know how satisfying it is to see verbal smackdowns, especially when the person you’re rooting against is on the losing end. It is unfortunate that we are at a place in our society where what used to be referred to as political news has become so heavily conflated with entertainment and viral sensationalism. Further, I call upon Democrat-aligned peers to to just stop acknowledging the existence of Candace Owens and similar figures, even if it is in the form of insult or opposition. Your rage is exactly what they want to see, and it’s what keeps them relevant enough to promote their business ventures and paid-content platforms to people who genuinely support them. The next time any pop-star — even one as hilarious and insightful as Cardi B can be — attacks Candace, Tomi or whoever else, restrain yourself from pressing like or retweet. If you really want them to stop promoting harmful and false ideas to an already-polarized half of our country, look away, move on and turn on “Real Housewives” or something of the sort. The fleeting chuckle from Twitter isn’t worth letting them leave their dark legacy on this moment in history.