Selena Gomez and Hailey Bieber threw fans a curveball this weekend when they posed for photos together, according to CNN.
Fans have long held the plotline that the two women are in some sort of rivalry over Bieber’s husband, Justin Bieber — Gomez’s ex-boyfriend. The actress and model smashed such claims when she got cozy for photos with Hailey Bieber at the Academy Museum Gala on Saturday.
The ‘feud,’ explained
For years, Gomez and Bieber were pitted against each other by fans. The women have never publicly fueled such rumors, but fans ruthlessly pushed the agenda that Bieber “stole” the male pop star from Gomez.
Gomez and Justin Bieber dated each other off and on between 2011 and 2018. When he quickly moved on and entered a relationship with Hailey Bieber, nosy fans speculated cheating was involved.
Hailey Bieber insists that her relationship with Justin Bieber never overlapped his relationship with Gomez. She said last month that she “period, point blank … was never in a relationship with him when he was with anybody,” per Harper’s Bazaar.
Justin and Hailey Bieber were legally married in New York in September 2018. Soon after, Gomez released her hit track “Lose You to Love Me,” which fans believe alluded to her relationship with Justin Bieber.
Fans of Gomez have spent years posting cruel comments on Hailey Bieber’s Instagram and TikTok accounts. In 2022, Bieber begged fans of Gomez to quit comparing her to the actress and to leave her alone.
“Leave me alone at this point,” she said in a TikTok video. “I’m minding my business. I don’t do anything, I don’t say anything. Leave me alone, please.”
Gomez has never condoned such behavior and has publicly spoken out against it on multiple instances.
“I do not stand for women tearing women down and I will never, ever be by that,” Gomez said in 2019 after the release of “Lose You to Love Me,” per USA Today.
Saturday’s photo moment comes in the wake of Bieber’s appearance on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast last week, where she addressed the so-called feud.
“(Fans) wish that he had ended up with someone else, and that’s fine. You can wish that all you want, but that’s just not the case,” she said during the podcast. “If we have moved on, why can’t you?”
Gomez used TikTok to address Bieber’s comments in the podcast. During the TikTok live stream, Gomez called fans’ bullying behavior “vile and disgusting.” The singer also said that if you support her beauty line, Rare (which recently released a lipstick and lip liner collection called Kind Words), you should understand the impact of harsh language.
“If you support Rare, I cannot thank you enough, but know that you are also representing what it means and that is words matter. Truly matter,” Gomez said.
Fan reactions
Fans loved seeing the two women come together to silence years of rumors that they were involved in a nasty feud.