US rapper Snoop Dogg is the latest celebrity to spark controversy by criticizing LGBTQ+ inclusion in children’s media, zeroing in on Pixar’s 2022 animated film Lightyear.

On a recent episode of Sarah Fontenot’s It’s Giving podcast, Snoop recalled taking his grandson to the theater to watch the Lightyear movie and being confounded by a particular scene. “We go to the movies, and my grandson says, ‘Papa Snoop, how does she have a baby with a woman? She is a woman,” he said. “Oh, s—, I didn’t come in for this s—. I just came to watch the g—— movie.”

The rapper admitted he had no immediate response to the moment and advised his grandson to sit tight and see what happened next in the movie. “They just said she had a baby. They are both women. How does she have a baby? S—. The movie ain’t over with,” Snoop said. “I’m scared to go to the movies. Like y’all throwing me in the middle of s— that I don’t have an answer for.”

Snoop told podcast host Fontenot the scene threw him off and that, while on one hand, it was an innocent display of a child processing a plot point they did not understand, the rapper wasn’t “ready” for that particular family moment. “It threw me for a loop,” he said. “These are kids that we have to show that at this age, like, they’re going to ask questions. They are going to ask. I don’t have an answer. And I was just there to go to sleep and watch the movie. That s— woke me up.”

On social media, backlash was swift, particularly after it was reported Snoop would still be performing at the Australian Football League’s 2023 Grand Final in November. PinkNews reported AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan defended Snoop’s place in the lineup, but it is yet to be seen if the AFL will cave on the issue or force the rapper to step down from the role.

It was not the first time Pixar’s Lightyear had been at the center of such a debate. When the film was released in June 2022, conservatives decried its same-sex kissing scene as a sly attempt to indoctrinate children. The controversy was so widespread that Disney ended up pulling the scene out before it hit theaters, only to reverse course and reinstate the sequence after Pixar employees internally criticized the company and outside LGBTQ+ advocacy groups called for more inclusion.

Chris Evans, who voices Lightyear’s Buzz Lightyear, defended the decision to include the same-sex kiss at the time. “The real truth is those people are idiots,” he said in an interview with Reuters Television. “There’s always going to be people who are afraid and unaware and trying to hold on to what was before. But those people die off like dinosaurs. I think the goal is to pay them no mind, march forward, and embrace the growth that makes us human.”

Lightyear, a spinoff of the Toy Story series, is set in outer space and chronicles the “real” Buzz Lightyear, the futuristic astronaut who was, within the Toy Story universe, an inspiration for the toy Buzz Lightyear. With strong merchandise sales and buzz around a well-known superhero character in Buzz Lightyear, Lightyear was expected to break box office records. But with muted reviews and only $226 million at the box office, many are citing the controversial same-sex inclusion as a potential factor.

A Dying Grasp On The Status Quo

In response to Snoop’s comments, many progressive voices on social media say the rapper’s comments are outdated and fear-based. They say the rapper is clinging to a structure that no longer reflects the modern landscape in which not every family has a mother and father. Snoop’s comments have not stopped him from still performing at a large-scale annual event in November, but his comments are likely to tarnish his international reputation at a time when many conservatives and progressives are taking opposing sides on the nature of modern family life.