Award shows really need to update their Gen Z mailing list. Weeks after Rachel Zegler was initially left off the Oscars guest list, YouTuber and recording artist JoJo Siwa revealed that she was not invited to the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards despite being nominated for favorite social music star. Per Variety, an anonymous source close to the Kids’ Choice Awards claims that Siwa’s exclusion from the ceremony “was an honest mistake.”
Siwa, who came out as queer last year, took to Instagram on Saturday to share that she hadn’t been invited to Nickelodeon awards. “A lot of you have been asking me why I’m not at the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards tonight, and the answer is very simple—I wasn’t invited,” Siwa said. “I’m not sure why, but I just didn’t get an invite.” In the caption of her post, she added, “I don’t want anyone to think it was my choice not to go…. I simply didn’t get an invite.”
After she revealed the snub, celebrities rallied around Siwa. Jersey Shore’s Snooki commented that she was “gonna write a note” and tagged @Nickelodeon, while Beverly Hills, 90210’s Brian Austin Green, who appeared on Dancing With the Stars with Siwa, wrote, “Fuck the kids choice awards 😂 you are too good for them.” Online chatter turned to speculation that Siwa was not invited to the Kids’ Choice Awards because she identifies as queer and has become a champion for LGBTQ+ causes. Since she came out as queer, Siwa has had somewhat of a rocky relationship with the kids’ network that made her one of Gen Z’s biggest stars. In September, Siwa said that Nickelodeon treated her “as only a brand” and claimed that the network wouldn’t let her perform songs from her 2021 movie-musical, The J Team, on tour. (Nickelodeon did not respond to a request for comment at the time.)
However, Variety’s anonymous source claims that Siwa did not get the invite “because of a much reduced audience size due to COVID protocols.” The anonymous source continued: “This had nothing to do with her as a person. That is so off the mark and very upsetting. It was truly an unfortunate mistake and she definitely should have been there.”
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