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The day before Rosa Parks’ birthday Nicki Minaj released her new single “Yikes.” If you managed not to listen to the song or avoid the recent news about Nicki, you might be wondering what Nicki Minaj and Rosa Parks have to do with one another.
But Minaj referenced the Civil Rights icon in the lyrics for the new song.
In an Instagram video of her mouthing the song, you can hear Minaj rap, “All you b*tches Rosa Parks/Uh oh, get your ass up.”
Naturally, there were more than a few people who found it disrespectful.
The following day was Ms. Parks’ birthday. And instead of reporting about the incident, we decided to simply celebrate her legacy. Because it’s what she deserves.
In the aftermath of the song, TMZ spoke to Parks’ nephew about what the family felt about the lyric and what he believes would be his aunt’s response.
Anita Peek, executive director at the institute told TMZ, if Parks was still alive today, she’d be extremely hurt by Minaj using her bus protest as a punchline. She said Nicki should have known better.
Parks’ nephew, William McCauley, told TMZ, “It was both heartbreaking and disrespectful that Nicki Minaj would have a lyric in a song that can be used negatively when mentioning someone who provided her the freedoms that she has today.”
Peek says that according to what she knew of Parks, the activist would not have condemned her but would use this as an opportunity to teach. Peek said that if Nicki Minaj fully understood what Rosa Parks endured, refusing to get up out of her seat in protest, she wouldn’t have rapped the line.
In the midst of all this, there was a report that Minaj apologized for the line, calling it bad timing.
But earlier today, Minaj, via her Instagram stories, not only denied every apologizing, she also said she doesn’t care about people who take offense to the lyric.
Oh.
Personally, I don’t know why Nicki would want to put herself in the place of the racist White folks in the Rosa Parks story but that’s her business.
You can see what people had to say about Nicki’s lyric on the following pages.
