Vanessa Hudgens, actress, blasted for ‘cultural appropriation’ on social media for hair accessory

Move over, Justin Timberlake. Vanessa Hudgens is the hated cultural appropriator du jour.

“On Monday, the ’Grease’ actress shared a style snap on Instagram in which a dreamcatcher hung from her brunette waves,” noted The New York Post’s gossip website, Page Six. “Hudgens, 26, was hit with several comments from followers accusing her of disrespecting Native American culture.”

“As of Tuesday, Hudgens had not taken down the original post,” Page Six added.

By contrast, actor and singer Justin Timberlake quickly apologized for some tweets made on Sunday regarding a fiery speech by actor Jesse Williams at the BET Awards.

According to People magazine, Mr. Williams complained that the entertainment industry “[b]ur[ies] Black people out of sight and out of mind while extracting our culture, our dollar, our entertainment like oil. Black gold.”

White performers had long had a habit of “trying us on like costumes before discarding our bodies like rinds of strange fruit,” Mr. Williams complained.

As People magazine reported Monday, Mr. Timberlake touched off a row on Twitter when he initially tweeted that he was “#inspired” by Mr. Williams’s speech and then seemed to dismissively respond to an African-American Twitter user who asked if Mr. Timberlake would “stop appropriating our music and culture.”

“Oh, you sweet soul. The more you realize that we are the same, the more we can have a conversation,” Mr. Timberlake replied. “Bye.”

After being hit with angry tweets in response, Mr. Timberlake apologized. “I feel misunderstood. I responded to a specific tweet that wasn’t meant to be a general response. I shouldn’t have responded anyway…” he said, adding minutes later, “I apologize to anyone that felt I was out of turn. I have nothing but LOVE FOR YOU AND ALL OF US. —JT.”