OPINION: Billie Eilish — You Are Wrong, Despite Your Performative Politics
- Richard Sykes
- 3 hours ago
- 2 min read
Opinion by Richard Sykes
For anyone that might have missed it, during her Grammy acceptance speech, Billie Eilish stated "F--- Ice" and "...no one is illegal on stolen land." It’s easy to throw around the phrase “stolen land,” but that gets messy fast. What about people who bought their homes legally and in good faith—are they supposed to be thieves now? Is Billie Eilish a thief because the Tongva tribe says her $3 million L.A. mansion sits on their ancestral land?
If Eilish meant that anyone can just squat on land that was once taken from someone else, that idea falls apart immediately. There’s a long‑standing legal rule—jus tertii—that basically says a trespasser can’t defend himself by claiming some third party is the real owner. For example: If Bob breaks into Mike’s house, he can’t say, “Well actually, Jim owns it.” Without that rule, nobody’s property—or even their money—would ever be secure. Every house, every wallet, every piece of land would be open season for lawsuits.
These principles are why most land today isn’t considered “stolen,” and why we don’t need a time machine to figure out who owns what. A lot of land was acquired through agreements—Manhattan being the classic example.
And thankfully, Eilish doesn’t actually live by her own rhetoric. If she did, anyone could stroll into her mansion claiming it belongs to the Tongva. The same laws that protect her protect everyone else from sweeping “you’re living on stolen land” accusations.
At the end of the day, performative politics tends to fade once celebrities step offstage and return to being regular people, even if only for a moment. But good luck trying to get them to acknowledge this fact!
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