Isaiah Harmison has defended Shannon St Claire’s “hands up don’t shoot” remark on Love Island USA season 3. Shortly after Isaiah’s introduction to Love Island, one specific interaction between him and the other islanders got a lot of attention from the fans. This particular scene was featured in one of the exclusive Paramount+ episodes labeled The Drop.
During a Love Island USA challenge, the islanders were tasked to get steamy with one another. As the new guy in the villa, Isaiah got a lot of attention that night. During one of his interactions, a girl held Isaiah’s shirt up with her mouth, and he raised his hands up in the air. In the background, Shannon St Claire’s very recognizable voice was heard saying “hands up don’t shoot” in reference to Isaiah holding his hands up. For context, “hands up don’t shoot” is a well-known Black Lives Matter slogan created after the shooting of Michael Brown in 2014.
Many Love Island USA fans who watched that particular The Drop episode criticized Shannon St Claire for saying such a thing, regardless of what her thoughts or intentions had been. Alas, Isaiah Harmison has now taken to social media to defend Shannon in regards to this situation. As seen in the Instagram post included below, Isaiah blamed the media for twisting words and making people look bad. He wrote, “There was a scene in the villa where Shannon said ‘hands up don’t shoot’ when I was participating in one of the games. It has been brought to my attention that this comment is being accused as a racist comment. Which couldn’t be farther from her intention.” Isaiah said that he felt the need to “clear the air on this false accusation.” Shannon then shared Isaiah’s post to her Instagram Story (screenshot below) and wrote, “Breaks my heart. Thank you [Isaiah]. Love you always.”
However, Shannon’s remark still hurt and offended many Black fans of Love Island. After all, that comment wasn’t exclusively about Isaiah, but about Black people who had been protesting against police brutality for years. As seen in the tweets below, many Black fans of the show took to social media to express how they disagree with Isaiah’s assessment of Shannon’s comment. One fan mentioned that a “joke” that trivializes police brutality shouldn’t be excused. Another fan called out the fact that Isaiah turned off the comments from his Instagram post once people disagreed with his statements. Other fans argued that Shannon should be the one explaining herself (not Isaiah), and that even good people can still do bad actions.
Isaiah is such a mf weirdo. Just because you’re okay with a yt Trumpie making jokes about/trivializing police brutality doesn’t mean the rest of us have to be. He really should have kept this to himself #LoveIslandUSA pic.twitter.com/CL9b2cbjvq
— Alexis ⓘ (@NotAgian2) August 8, 2021
Not Isaiah trying to silence Black folx on IG who were offended by Shannon’s “Hands up, don’t shoot” comment by saying she’s sweet and not racist but proceeds to turn off his comments when ppl call him out. Corny. #LoveIslandUSA
— ANGELA BASSETT STAN (@quentenbydesign) August 8, 2021
The way Shannon should be the one explaining herself not him . As a black woman this comment was very insensitive ESPECIALLY with what happened this past year. It doesn’t matter if you guys are friends “hands up don’t shoot” shouldn’t have been said point blank #LoveIslandUSA pic.twitter.com/HXmTSGbGah
— idk gurly 😀 (@ohkaelolz) August 8, 2021
My stance on Shannon is that you can be a good person but do a bad action . Shannon making the comment “hands up ,don’t shoot “ was still insensitive and a ignorant thing to say no matter how you look at it . We’ve as a community just came from protesting …. #loveislandusa
— yerrr jah (@The_jdiaries) August 8, 2021
It seems that Isaiah wants to move on from this particular situation, but many fans were very hurt by Shannon’s remark and think that it shouldn’t be excused this easily or this quickly. Alas, only time will tell if Isaiah and/or Shannon will address this situation any further.
Love Island USA season 3 airs Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays at 9pm ET/PT on CBS.
Sources: Isaiah Harmison on Instagram, Shannon St Claire on Instagram
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