Several days after a male model alleged that Katy Perry humiliated him by pulling down his pants in front of others at a party, a TV presenter in Russia said that the singer tried to force a kiss on her, Page Six reported.
The accusation by Tina Kandelaki in a Russian newspaper marks the second time in a week that Perry has been in the news for allegedly being sexually inappropriate with others.
Kandelaki, 43, told Rossiyskaya Gazeta that Perry made unwelcome advances on her at a party, though it wasn’t clear from the interview when the party took place, according to Page Six.
“Once I was invited to a private party with Katy Perry, where she, being pretty tipsy, chose me as an object for the manifestation of her passion,” Kandelaki said, according to Page Six. “I managed to fight back, strength training was not in vain, and Katy instantly found a new victim for kisses, hugs and dirty dances.”
Kandelaki added, “As far as I can tell, there were no casualties at the party, but I won’t be surprised at the stream of memories of unhappy fans who for years carried this inside themselves, and now they suddenly remembered the scolded dignity.”
Page Six said Kandelaki could not be reached for comment. Perry’s representatives also could not be reached.
Perry, 34, has yet to publicly address allegations made by model Josh Kloss over the weekend. He wrote on Instagram that Perry made inappropriate and nonconsensual contact with him after they worked together in 2010, performing steamy scenes for her “Teenage Dream” video.
Both accusations are likely to continue a debate: Is the singer is being falsely accused and unfairly targeted? Or in a post-#MeToo world, should she be held accountable — as any powerful male entertainer would be if he had been called out for sexually harassing behavior?
Kloss said a double-standard should not exist for Perry because she is a woman. He alleged that the pop star greeted him at a party a couple years after they worked on the video by pulling down his sweatpants and underwear to expose his genitals to the crowd.
“Can you imagine how pathetic and embarrassed I felt?” he wrote in one of several posts related to his allegations. “I just say this now because our culture is set on proving men of power are perverse. But females with power are just as disgusting.”
Perry’s friends and fans have accused Kloss of fabricating the allegations and appropriating the intentions of the #MeToo movement to garner publicity.
But others pointed out that Perry has been accused of being sexually inappropriate before. She generated headlines in March 2018 for her overt and sometimes uncomfortable flirting with male contestants during her stint as a judge last year on “American Idol.”
Most notably, Perry kissed 19-year-old contestant Benjamin Glaze without his consent after he mentioned that he had never been kissed before and that he was saving that moment for when he was in a relationship. Perry beckoned Glaze over to the judges for what he thought would be a kiss on the cheek, but the pop star turned her head at the last minute and laid one on his lips instead.
Glaze told the New York Times that he didn’t feel sexually harassed. However, if Perry had asked if she could kiss him, he would have said “no … I was uncomfortable immediately.”
The incident sparked discussion online about whether viewers would consider it harmless flirting and charming if an older male pop star had tricked a 19-year-old female contestant into kissing him.
Perry, who is engaged to actor Orlando Bloom, opened up about exploring her sexuality while growing up in a conservative Christian family when accepting the National Equity Award at the 2017 Human Rights Campaign Gala in Los Angeles.
Perry said she grew up being told that “homosexuality was synonymous with the word abomination” and described how she would “pray the gay away at my Jesus camps.” She described how her 2008 song “I Kissed a Girl” started a conversation. She joked to the audience, “Truth be told … I did more than that!”
“But how was I going to reconcile that with the gospel-singing girl raised in youth groups that were pro conversion camps?” Perry said. “What I did know is that I was curious, and even then I knew that sexuality was not as black and white as this dress. Honestly, I haven’t always gotten it right.”
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