Folks in Pittsburgh have been up in arms ever since it was announced that Iggy Azalea would be headlining the city’s Pride festival this weekend. But they can all relax because the 25-year-old rapper just announced she won’t be making an appearance after all.
Upon learning Azaela would be performing, several LGBT groups, including the Pittsburgh chapter of Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, pulled their sponsorships, citing a string of homophobic and racist tweets the Australian hip hop artist wrote back in 2010 as their reason for doing so.
One of the tweets read: “When guys whisper in each others ears I always think its kinda homo.”
Another said: “Wondered why my butt felt like it was about to grow legs, flip me off & walk away. then I remembered i played soccer yestrdy w 5 dyke bitches.”
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Azalea was also accused of being racist for writing tweets such as, “When the relay starts, I’m a runaway slave-master” and “Just saw 5 black men get arrested out the front of popeyes. #damn #stereotypes.”
In a lengthy statement posted to her Twitter page this week, the “Trouble” songwriter said she would no longer be performing at Pittsburgh Pride, then she apologized for her past.
“I am firm believer in equality,” she wrote. “Unfortunately in the past as a young person, I used words I should not have. The last thing I want is for something so careless said to be interpreted as reflective of my character.”
She continued: “As an adult I would never use them because I understand they play a detrimental role in the fight for issues that I do truly believe in.”
What do you think? Should Azalea have been axed from the lineup for flippant tweets she wrote five years ago? Sound off in the comments below.
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notevenwrong
Well, she did make a nice apology, so I’d say give her a break. We’ve all done thoughtless and regrettable things in our past.
Arcamenel
Send her fake ass back to australia.
Michael Eskridge
I boycott her because she’s a fake “rapper”
Masc Pride
“Homophobic” is way overused, and pretty inaccurately too. Why did she originally agree to do a pride appearance if she’s supposedly homophobic? So funny how gays can take c0ck up the butt with no problem but get so butthurt over harmless jokes. These are punchlines, and some of them are quite funny. Iggy is a mostly comedic rapper. A lot of her jokes are no different from what would be said at a Comedy Central roast. We’re getting dangerously close to censorship in this country.
Robby Robinson
…bitches please did you see that hot mess with Britney a few weeks ago.
OrlArno Barajas
Lets burn that bitch alive!
AndYouWillDeal
SICK of these goddamn SJW and their tumblr campaigns, obviously these idiots cannot take a joke
Avery Alvarez
I think Iggy is on the way out.
She appropriated a culture that is not hers without any respect or due diligence into the history of it.
She made many enemies in the biz
She’s hasn’t really had a strong hit since “Fancy”, which makes her to close to becoming a 1 Hit Wonder.
And now’s she’s engaged, which is usually the kind of stunt these tricks pull when no one wants to pay attention to them anyone.
As far as homophobia goes, i don’t think she is. Just got a big mouth.
DCFarmboi
The truth is that this genre of performers makes their money by using cheap, attention getting stunts. (Khardasians?). If they would get off that train, all of us would be better off.
DarkZephyr
@Carter McCallister: The article states that she pulled out….
tricky ricky
I have no idea who this person is.
Ryan Macintyre
what an idiotic and degrading photo.
We as a community are much better then this.
I am ashamed of this post Queerty and will be unfollowing this page.
Mohamed Khatroshi
She’s An Asshole. ð???
Giancarlo85
@Ryan Macintyre: How was it degrading or idiotic?
Azalea is yesterday news. Much like Keisha who nobody gives a shit about anymore.
takingliberties
Forget her fancy politics. Her music is horrid and she can’t move to save her life. Pittsburgh should release a collective sigh of relief. Fat lumberjack bitches will all be at IHOP anyway.
Mark Pointon
Constantino Constantinou
The untalented animal
badtungsten
@Avery Alvarez: I agree totally. My big issue with her is the cultural appropriation and what I call her “vocal blackface.”
jjose712
Sorry, but that was ridiculous. If we are going to condemn people who said something inapropiate in her teens we have a big problem.
And it’s a clear double standard because there are a lot of other rappers who said way worse things (and more recently) who are celebrated when they changed their minds.
And frankly, i would love someone explain me the whole cultural appropation thing, because your skin pigments don’t necessarily make your culture. I’m pretty sure sure there are black people who were raised hearing country, rock or classical music, genres generally associated to white people and that’s their culture in terms of music. And it’s obvious there’s a lot of white kids who were raised hearing rap, and musically it’s their culture.
I don’t know Azalea’s case to know if she appropiated or not, and frankly nobody who attacked her explained why. Being white and australian doesn’t mean a thing, because the USA exported its music everywhere
jason smeds
Wasn’t Iggy Azalea using homophobic slurs as recently as a few months ago? Thank goodness the Pittsburgh GLBT community realized what a gross person she is.
enfilmigult
@jjose712: “If we are going to condemn people who said something inapropiate in her teens we have a big problem.”
Yeah, that’s the thing though. Although her apology tries to give every impression she said this stuff a long time ago as a kid, she’s 25 now, so she was at least 21 at the time. The tweets are not great (there are more), but to my mind the apology’s worse in the way it tries to dodge responsibility for them.
F. Jay Ver
Igloo Australia I hardly knew you. Actually I still don’t know who you are.
AndYouWillDeal
@Avery Alvarez: She appropriated a culture because she does hip-hop? So I guess Whitney Houston appropriated white culture when she sang those pretty ballads with her nice gowns, right?
badtungsten
@AndYouWillDeal: It’s cultural appropriation because she is playing a character and making money doing so without acknowledging that’s what she’s doing. She presents herself as authentic while she is anything but. She grew up in Australia, not exactly a bastion of African American inner-city culture. So when she modifies her voice to mimic the way an inner city African American might sound while rapping, then yes, she is appropriating someone else’s culture and profiting from it. It isn’t much different than white actors in the 1920’s painting their faces black and being paid to do it. It’s also in the same neighborhood as sports fans who don feathers and face paint while chanting “Indian” sounds at football games. On a side note, part of her popularity issue is related to professional courtesy. My husband and I live in Las Vegas and he is a big fan. She has performed here twice and he had tickets to one of the shows. She kept the audience waiting for THREE hours before finally deciding she was ready to perform. Stunts like that do not grow popularity with today’s fickle audiences. If Iggy wants to rap, let her rap in her REAL voice, not one she copied from other people who don’t enjoy the privilege she does.
Whitney Houston did not appropriate anything. She sang every one of her songs beautifully in her natural voice. She wasn’t playing a character, she was being herself.
gskorich
i think people need to relax
jasentylar
@badtungsten: Thank you for explaining that so eloquently. And as for Whitney, she sang like no other. People try to mimic her actually.