Olivia Jade Giannulli joined Jada Pinkett Smith, daughter Willow Smith and mom Adrienne Banfield-Norris on “Red Table Talk” earlier this month to discuss her role in the college cheating scandal, which saw her parents — former “Full House” star Lori Loughlin and billionaire fashion mogul Mossimo Giannulli — each serving brief prison sentences after paying a half-million dollars to fraudulently ensure admission to UCLA for Olivia Jade and sister Isabella Rose.
The Instagram influencer shared her mea culpas, and also griped about the endorsement deals the scandal cost her. Banfield-Norris (a.k.a. “Gammy”), however, was unimpressed with Giannulli’s tale of woe. Describing the “violent dehumanization” inflicted on the Black community, she declared, “There’s so much inequality and inequity that when you come to the table with something like this, it’s like, ‘Child, please!’”
Added Banfield-Norris: “I’m exhausted with everything that we have to deal with as community, and I just don’t have the energy to put into the fact that you lost your endorsements. Or that you’re not in school right now. At the end of the day, you’re going to be okay. Your parents are going to go in and do their 60 days and pay their fines and you’ll live your life. There are so many of us where it’s not going to be that situation. A year from now, I might feel differently. It’s very difficult for me to feel compassionate about you.”
Banfield-Norris discussed that particular “Red Table Talk” episode with the “Keep It” podcast, and admitted she found the whole thing “frustrating.”
“I felt like as a 21-year-old young adult, that she needed to be way more aware of what’s going on in the world, and that was a little frustrating,” she explained.
“I heard people make comments, like, ‘Well, kids don’t watch the news.’ Please,” she continued. “The news on TV is not the only place where you understand what’s going on with the world and if you think that then you’re old! Because young people are not relying on the news — my generation is not relying on the news. I’m on my phone, on social media all the time.”
However, Banfield-Norris did concede that it can be easy for someone as privileged as Giannulli to be untouched by the suffering going on all around her.
“Her life experiences have not put her in the space where she needs to be concerned about those kinds of things, really,” she added. “I don’t really know how to address that because it is about how you’re raised and what you’re exposed to.”
