SNEAK PEEK
- Upon selling an NFT of Tucker Carlson on his show, an artist has raised $14,000 for abortion rights.
- The NFT features an image of Carlson appearing next to an unintentionally pro-choice message.
- The message read: “Making an informed choice regarding your own body shouldn’t be controversial.”
Tucker Carlson, the host of Fox News, unknowingly became the subject of a fundraising effort for abortion rights. The incident took place after a screengrab from an episode of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” was minted into an NFT.
Created by artist Jenny Holzer, the NFT was auctioned off on Saturday to raise funds for three reproductive rights organizations.
The image was a screenshot of a tweet displaying an episode of Fox News featuring Carlson and Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson that aired in May 2021.
This is like a Jenny Holzer installation or something right pic.twitter.com/EeoqtI7nh2
— Gillian Branstetter (@GBBranstetter) May 12, 2021
The NFT also has an unintentionally pro-choice message displayed on the Fox News chyron during the show. Moreover, the phrase “Standing Up For What’s Right” was also shown.
While Carlson and Johnson were arguing that deciding whether to take COVID-19 vaccines should be decided by people, Holzer interpreted the scene in a different way in the screengrab.
In an Instagram post, Holzer wrote,
The chyron on Tucker Carlson Tonight on May 11, 2021, proclaimed that MAKING AN INFORMED CHOICE REGARDING YOUR OWN BODY SHOULDN’T BE CONTROVERSIAL.
Holzer said in her post that the conflicts between Carlson’s earlier statements on the vaccines and his present stance on abortion were the reason she thought of her earlier work on the anxiety, humor, banality, tragedy, and urgency of modern life, which is why the NFT came into the picture.
Meanwhile, the NFT, BODY, was sold for 12.1 Ethereum on Saturday to an undisclosed buyer who already has various other NFTs. The NFT went up for auction on Friday after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
Gillian Branstetter, who sent out the original tweet in May 2021, shared that she would donate her funds to the DC Abortion Fund.
Carlson railed against abortion rights following the SCOTUS ruling on Roe v. Wade. The previous week, he claimed that corporations were assisting employees in abortions out-of-state since people with no families are cheaper for the company.
