Thought the Azealia Banks / RuPaul drama had reached peak output?
Not so.
Just to recap — Banks cried foul on RuPaul‘s song, “Call Me Mother,” off his album, American, claiming the beat was ripped off from her 2016 single, “The Big Big Beat.”
Here are the two tracks back-to-back:
How about we take this to the next level?
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The album was reportedly removed from Spotify while the matter was investigated, but was returned to the streaming service within a couple of days.
That prompted a series of tweets from Banks in which she said of Ru:
“I’m disappointed in him first and foremost as a black person. He was supposed to have my back … But he went with popular white gay sentiment and felt like I was disposable enough to steal from and discard. F*ck him.”
But apparently, she wasn’t quite finished. On Monday, Banks took to Twitter again:
I have so many good things going on right now and I’m so fucking annoyed that these dragged out clowns have found a way to attach themselves to me yet AGAIN. Like shit just because I’m queer doesn’t mean we walk step and step. I be trying to live my gay life with the KUNTS
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
And the white gays always find a way to inject their selfish ass ideas about how queer people are supposed to be into EVERYTHING I do. Why can’t you all just go the fuck away ? Seriously
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
Black queer women have a different fucking life from gay white men. Stop trying to police my queer experience and tell me how to be. You guys are honestly suffocating and I wish you would go away and stay away for good.
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
I’ve been actively trying to live my best black queer female life and you keep trying to force me to consider you when you have absolutely no consideration for me. I just want you guys to go the fuck away. Tired of this fake ass lgbtq shit niggas are not a community you guys are
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
TYRANTS. And not invited to my life. Get out and stay out. Kunt brigade only
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
You think you’re punishing me by copying my music but you’re actually showing to me how fucking jealous of me you are. You hate how fabulous and free I am and hate the fact that there’s no amount of makeup or girdles that could make you me. @rupaul.
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
Tagging the person you’d like to leave you alone is not always the best strategy to get that person to leave you alone, but that’s neither here nor there.
The latest comments tipped one performer over the edge — Drag Race season 10’s Monet X Change tweeted:
I will no longer perform my Azealia Mix…EVER. @cheapyxo is rotted TRASH.
— Monét X Change (@monetxchange) June 5, 2018
And because this is Twitter and everyone has more gasoline to add to the fire, Banks took Monet’s bait:
Bitch your crotch is rotting and fermenting under that sour mildew ass girdle sus ???? I do not give a goddamn .. ??? https://t.co/vdHfowLtgc
— CHEAPY XO (@cheapyxo) June 5, 2018
And why would things end there?
Good one Azealia. Gotta love a tired bitch with preschool reads. Do you not realize that the LGBTQIA+ Community is the ONLY reason you have a career? The hetero community wasn’t checkin for yo ass before this debacle, and they won’t after. Obscurity is where you shall exist. https://t.co/yGQ5TF3iEY
— Monét X Change (@monetxchange) June 5, 2018
Meanwhile, RuPaul opted to take a more cryptic road.
We can’t say for sure if these recent tweets are directed towards Banks, but the hints seem clear:
"Rather than being your thoughts and emotions, be the awareness behind them"~@EckhartTolle pic.twitter.com/ShJJpfrTeq
— RuPaul (@RuPaul) June 5, 2018
It’s good advice for anyone who feels things intensely — separating emotions from the orbits they inhabit within us is no easy feat, and in the age of Twitter wars, it’s all too easy to dive headfirst into the flaming pools of raw impulse and reaction.
Then again, even Ru seemingly couldn’t resist reminding everyone that yes, her album — including “Call Me Mother” — is definitely available on **SPOTIFY**:
ALBUM "American" featuring "Kitty Girl" & "Call Me Mother" **SPOTIFY** https://t.co/CB3llhByWV pic.twitter.com/euJUO6Ukcl
— RuPaul (@RuPaul) June 5, 2018
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Donston
As usual, she has some fair points that are marred by bitter, angry, hypocritical rambling. Expecting everyone who isn’t a completely cis gender and/or 100% hetero (which may represent like 60% of the planet) to be able to relate to each other and support one another is rather naive. Everyone’s experiences, politics, ethics, orientation, sense of gender and the general way they wish to live their lives is different, and you have to respect that. And Ru is indeed completely in the wrong for monetizing that song without giving Azealia her end. But Azealia needs to understand that constant race-baiting and using hateful flame language (which Azealia has done throughout her career) doesn’t do anything for anyone in the long run. And of course, she comes off completely classless as usual. But this girl is “off”. We all know this.
It’s also strange that she’s suddenly referring to herself as “gay” and “queer” when as far as I know she’s only legitimately dated white dudes, the type of person she hates the most.
zedus headus
I think most people are pretty comfortable in their gender. It must be a terrible, heart-breaking affliction to feel as if you were born the wrong gender biologically, but that is hardly a significant number of people. It might be the loudest group, the most sensational minority. Neither will I ever understand people like this artist who throw such shade on gay white males. Separate yourself from us, that’s fine. But, when it starts storming don’t try to shelter under my umbrella.
Donston
As has been highlighted over the past few years, just because you’re not trans doesn’t mean you feel 100% cis gender all the time. You can be “comfortable” in your gender and still not feel 100% cis.
There’s been a lot of “white gay males” diatribes over the past couple years, some of it even coming from white gay males. And I get it. However, even as a black person, a lot of it seems to be coming from places like envy, misandry, self-misandry, internalized homophobia, being “queer” but constantly wanting to “prove” your blackness, being a white gay male but wanting to prove you’re not shallow and selfish and can support other people, hetero worship/hetero envy, or just being batsh*t crazy. There unfortunately tends to be a lot of other things going on beneath it all, stuff people get scared to touch on, which ends up killing any real conversation.
But Azealia will go after any demo. That’s just her nature.
jorgecruz
Its obviously the same beat but so what? Producers sell their beats to be used on multiple songs all the time. If Azalea owns it and it was used without compensation then she can take civil action to get paid. The ABW routine hasn’t done anything to help her career though, maybe she should try something new.
queerty02
The beat comes from I Wish a Muthaf*cka Would. Azealia is just pulling her typical bs for attention, not realizing it is the worst kind of attention.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bqs1qhYmpE
DarkZephyr
Why is she screaming at white gays over this? Mama Ru and Monet are black. is it because some of the people responding to her tweets are white? Well why is she posting to public social media?
Charlie in Charge
It seems to be a bit of a “no true Scotsman” argument.
Moxycontin
Uhm. Girl.
While I can get the vibe off of her tweets that she’s upset that she is being placed under the same “umbrella” as “queer white men” who she doesn’t want anything to do with considering she’s a “queer black woman”, and she is unhappy that someone assumes they’re one in the same when she thinks they’re vastly different….. I’m gonna point out that she is bi ? sex ? u ? al, and if she doesn’t want herself being aligned or whatever she’s going on about with gay white men then she sure as hell shouldn’t be aligning herself with queer women. She’s essentially the goddamn volunteer fireman of lesbians.
Also, all this nonsense about “kunts” and with how much of a queer woman she is reminds me a hell of a lot of every bitrendual girl I knew in high school and college. The ones who, you know, fell into perfectly mundane, heterosexual cis woman lifestyles by the time they hit forty, regarding any previous bisexualism/queer inclinations as “a phase”.
Dymension
She has issues. I just heard both songs and I prefer Ru’s song. Also, I just don’t hear her claims. These songs are very different.
lemonseed
Right? I’m listening and getting different experiences from each song.
Caprice Goldberg
OMG LOL @ #KuntBrigadeOnly
How is this not yet a thing?
Donston
She has been referring to her fans as that for years.
DCguy
It seems like her only argument is a set of pre-prepared attacks against “White Gay Men”.
The problem being that RuPaul isn’t White, and neither is the other queen she is fighting with. If you try to attack somebody and use attacks against a completely different type of person you may want to rethink sending that tweet.
Look, if she has a case, then sue RuPaul.
Kangol
Azealia Banks craves attention. She’s constantly going off on other artists, rants about white dudes then dates them, etc. As Donston says, there’s a shred of legitimacy in her claim about RuPaul and the beat, but Azealia blows it up by her over-the-top charges and antics. As all the comments on this thread demonstrate, she’s achieved the attention she wanted.
QueerTruth
Gross. I’m exhausted with celebrities ranting hate.
Why does Queerty give them an additional podium?
Bob LaBlah
As the saying goes “whatever it takes to keep your name out there, do it”. Next.