Dear Nicki Minaj
I watched the last half of the BET Awards last night and thought the production values were very good. Nicki Minaj won the Best Female Rapper award for the 5th time last night and accepted the award like Iggy Azalea sat on her throne of swords and declared war on all things Minaj. It was highly unprofessional, out-of-pocket, and uncalled for.
Dear Nicki Minaj,
Hello! I am a fan of yours. I have your first studio album, some tracks where you featured on other artists’ work, and had planned to buy your latest singles, but now I’m not so sure. Yeah, see, the thing is that I like Iggy Azalea and have for a little while now. I know, she comes off as awkward at times and is trying to figure out her way in the U.S. music market with T.I. pulling her along. But she does give credit and respect to those who’ve come before her. I got to know her through her independent stuff she has out (thanks to my BFF) and really like the production and the lyrics. I can relate to some things. This was all before she met T.I.,so if your comment about her not writing her own lyrics means something, please let us know if we’re being hoodwinked.
Last night, you won your 5th BET Best Female Rapper award. I remember the first time you won. I didn’t remember them having that category the year before. For years you were arguably the only female rapper in the game at the time with numbers to back it up. Congrats on all that success, by the way. You worked hard and it showed.
You had a #1 album on Billboard. I mean…a whole album, not just a single, and that’s not enough? This happened TWICE (Roman: Reloaded was #1 too).
However, Nicki, when you gave your acceptance speech and started in on how you write your own lyrics and are authentic – unlike another rapper whom you didn’t name but we all know is Iggy Azalea – I took issue. First, you poked out your breast implants and it’s been known that you had butt injections for a while now. Both Pink Friday and Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded were gimmicky albums meant to cross you right on over to Pop and get some white fans along with their delicious money. Now you’re doing this “I’m authentic” thing for your second album, and that’s fine. I support it. But don’t tell us that you’ve been authentic all this time when we have proof that refutes it.
Futhermore, there aren’t that many female rappers in the business, and you gave a speech that touched on that, then took down another female rapper. Is this how you get when you finally have some real competition, jealous and petty? There is a mood that says women can’t get along. Family Guy pokes fun at it often and I hear that view all the time. I know more women who get along than ones who don’t, but did you have to play into that stereotype last night? You came off as no better than a Twitter stan or Twitter Honey and we know you’re better than that. I was waiting for a “Step your shoe game up, ho!” that thankfully never came.
You don’t get as far as you’ve gotten by being stupid and sounding dumb. Lil’ Kim did the same thing to you when you were taking off and you hated it. Why are you doing the same thing to Iggy? Yes, she made rap finally go to #1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and instead of celebrating that for your genre, you want to be petty and destroy that. Because that makes sense. Iggy just got here and you’re already trying to Lil’ Kim her out of relevance. We saw how that ended for Lil’ Kim and where you landed. I’d recommend that you to drop the hate and jealousy before you wind up PayPal-ing and Priority Mailing phantom albums.
Did anyone actually get this?
I like professionalism in art. Yes, creative arts are fun and exploratory, but you need to also be professional. You displayed no professionalism or class last night and it hurt my heart as your fan. Please focus on your work and keep doing you. You’re the only thing you can control. You can’t control Iggy’s Billboard spots, album sales, or eventual Grammy win over your album, and once you accept that, you’ll be happier. I know musical bloggers and writers wrote you off this year already, but take it up with them by proving them wrong with your work. Stop being Lil’ Kim and be better than her. Otherwise, that person on the left will be replaced by Iggy in February (see below) and it will bother you incessantly.
Anyway, Lil’ Kim had the ovaries to actually name you (“Nicki Garbaj”) but you shaded without naming a name. That’s kinda punk and inauthentic. If you’re gonna be about it, be about it. I just wish you would have been about some professionalism, class, and appreciating all that your hard work actually gets you. There’s enough room for both of you (and more) in the game. Let the competition improve you and inspire you to do better, like champions do.
Sincerely,
Your fan, Jamin
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Category: Entertainment, News
I was perfectly fine with it. Iggy has made racist remarks against Mexicans and Asians and used anti-gay slurs; not to mention her cultural misappropriations. It angers me how someone like her-whose not American, southern or black-can just take a slice of the pie, behave like she does and rise to the top with ease, while artists who actually belong to the community she imitates have to work a thousand times harder to be successful, respected and accepted, like Nicki has.
Thanks for reading. Iggy made dumb remarks that someone can make when they’re 18 or so, and while that’s not okay, like Justin Bieber who knew better, she was still young and dumb. The stuff I saw wasn’t recent but from like 2010 (shout-out to all those petty people researching hard on Twitter to find those tweets). (I mean, truth be told, EYE was quite ratchet when I first started on Twitter, but I’ve grown.
Let’s discuss this easy rise to the top – Iggy has been in the game a while and had international success well before “Fancy” was released and before anything on “The New Classic” was produced. She reached out to T.I. after she had achieved success internationally and asked him to help her produce her first studio album, which was released in the U.S. She’s not lying about the amount of work she’s put in for years since she left Australia. Furthermore, her influences for rap came from a lot of Southern rappers, and she wasn’t in an area that encouraged her to develop her own “style” (who was rapping in rural New South Wales?), so yeah, it does sound copied. Regardless, I still like her and don’t hold anything against her because I don’t see her as being malicious. Being white helped her stand out in rap and people caught on to it, and lo and behold, we have the newest sensation in pop rap.
And let’s talk about what Nicki did. Nicki had some underground stuff but Lil Wayne found her and made her spit to him and gave her a deal. THEN they took a gamble and Barbie-fied her and she developed herself into a gimmicky pop rapper and broke records. She made money by being inauthentic IF THIS CURRENT NICKI IS AUTHENTIC, and thus has no real room to talk about who’s “real” in rap and who isn’t. You got to where you are, Nicki, by being kinda fake. It was unprofessional, rude, and Iggy’s response shows who is professional and who isn’t. Iggy still got a #1 single and broke a rap record and black America’s anger is directed toward the wrong person.