‘Learn to joke:’ Italian playboy waves away criticism over ‘sexist’ ass-slapping video

A celebrity Italian millionaire, musician, and all-round playboy, has dismissed feminist outrage after posting an Instagram video showing him dancing and slapping models on board a yacht.

Gianluca Vacchi is the consummate European playboy. A chiseled, tanned, trust-fund millionaire, Vacchi has dabbled in entrepreneurship, but seemingly spends most of his time dancing in his underwear with supermodels, living La Dolce Vita. 

Lately though, Vacchi has dipped his toes into a career in music, releasing the club track ‘Mueve,’ and promoting it with an Instagram video that has Italian feminists up in arms. In the video, the silver-haired Italian dances to the song aboard a yacht, at one point drumming along to the track on the bikini-clad behinds of four models.

Commenters voiced their outrage, calling the video a display of “sexist bravado,”“demeaning to women,” and “a sad moment.” Responding to one commenter in English, the 52-year-old said “I respect them a lot; learn to joke if you wanna respect life.”

The models in Vacchi’s video certainly seemed unbothered by the playboy’s antics, and definitely knew what they were getting into. The Italian stallion posts similar pictures and videos almost daily, nearly all featuring him and a bevy of tanned beauties in some state of undress.

The displays of eye-candy have proven a nifty marketing trick for Vacchi too, earning him more than 13 million Instagram followers and notching his music video up more than a million views on YouTube. 

Vacchi reportedly nets more than $16,000 for a single Instagram post. Whether his provocative behavior will bring in even more cash or precipitate a #MeToo downfall, however, is something that remains to be seen.

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