Serena Williams Criticizes New York Hotel for Insensitive Cotton Plant Display: A Historical Context

Sep 26, 2025 04:42 pm CST

Tennis legend Serena Williams has sparked conversation about historical sensitivity after criticizing a New York City hotel for displaying cotton plants as decoration. The African American athlete expressed her discomfort on Instagram, connecting the display to America's painful history of slavery and cotton plantations, describing the cotton as feeling "unnatural" and comparing it to nail polish remover cotton.