Queer Eye’s Tan France wants to give Boris Johnson a makeover – but not for the reasons you think
It will take more than a new hairstyle to redeem Boris Johnson. (Getty/ WPA Pool)
Queer Eye star Tan France wants to give UK prime minister Boris Johnson a makeover – but not for the reasons you think.
The 38-year-old, who revealed in a 2 August Instagram post that he and his husband Rob France have welcomed their first son, made the surprising makeover offer in an interview with Attitude magazine.
France said he would love to give Johnson a makeover of the moral and spiritual variety.
Asked which celebrity he would give a Queer Eye makeover to, and why, France responded that “normally we [the Queer Eye cast] don’t answer that question”.
“But the reason I’m going to say this person is because it’s not about clothes, I couldn’t give a f**k about this person’s clothes, or the person’s crazy hair…” France continued.
He then revealed that the person he would pick is Boris Johnson. “It’s about getting him to understand my people better, so that he treats us as equals,” France explained.
He continued: “I’m not just talking about the queers… I’m talking about people of colour, Muslims in particular.
“I wouldn’t love to spend a week with him, but I would love for him to experience me for a week and then tell me I’m not equal to him.”
Giving Boris Johnson’s record a Queer Eye makeover
The Conservative prime minister has a tarnished record when it comes to LGBT+ rights.
Not only is he the leader of the party that fought to bring in the reviled Section 28, a law that banned schools from “promoting homosexuality” and caused untold damage to a generation of LGBT+ people, Johnson made infamous bigoted comments about “tank-topped bum boys” when he was a newspaper columnist in the nineties.
More recently, he was forced to apologise for comparing Muslim women who wear the burka to “letter boxes” and “bank robbers”.
And this year, Johnson defended inviting Islamophobic and anti-LGBT+ Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban to a Downing Street reception.
Asked about the PM’s position on Orban’s comments about “Muslim invasions” and migrants being “poison”, a Downing Street spokesperson said: “On all human rights issues we do not shy away from raising them. The PM has condemned those specific comments, which were divisive and wrong.”
While a Queer Eye makeover might be just what the British prime minister needs, Tan France is absolutely right – it will take much, much more than a new hairstyle to redeem Boris Johnson.
