Barbz take issue with WatchMojo's video listing the 'Anaconda' hitmaker's traditional outfit in her 'Pound the Alarm' music video as one of the 'Top 10 Reasons Why Nicki Minaj is Hated.'
- Jul 10, 2020
AceShowbiz - Nicki Minaj's fans have received an apology they deserved after WatchMojo mocked her carnival costume. The Canadian-based video producer, publisher and syndicator issued an immediate apology after they were notified that they disrespected the Trinidadian-born rapper's culture by slamming her outlandish outfit, which is actually a traditional outfit.
In a "Top 10 Reasons Why Nicki Minaj is Hated" video originally published on YouTube in 2016, WatchMojo listed "She makes tacky outfit choices" as the No. 8 reason why people don't like the "Anaconda" hitmaker. But it's the footage accompanying the claim that offended her fans, as it featured Nicki wearing a traditional outfit in her "Pound the Alarm" music video.
Baffled over the allegation, a fan posted part of the clip on Twitter and commented, "that is literally part of her culture tf??"
After noticing the criticism, WatchMojo quickly took to the blue-bird app to extend their apology. "That was a regrettable choice on our part," they tweeted on Thursday, July 9. "We didn't mean any disrespected but acknowledge the criticism and apologize for the choice and timing of that particular outfit of Nicki's in the video. We are always striving to learn and do better, so thank you for helping us!"
"Some of you called out something we said in a 2016 video featuring Nicki Minaj," they wrote in another post along with a lengthy statement. "We wanted to address it below and apologize to those who were offended. Regardless of the intent, when watching the video we understood why some were offended."
The statement read, "We used to produce a series of 'Reasons why an Artist is Hated,' it was our equivalent to Roasts - basically. We used to pair our top 10 songs by a given artist with those, so alongside Top 10 Nicki Minaj videos (2015) we did Reasons why she was hated (2016). We generally tried to not make them mean as we are fans of the artists ourselves."
Noting that they "rarely take videos down," WatchMojo claimed that they did so with "the reasons Nicki Minaj is hated video" because "of a bad choice of video accompanying an entry." They went on acknowledging the problematic part, "In one entry, we wanted to highlight that some of her critics would call her style tacky. We weren't the first to call her style tacky, that that's somewhat moot. When we mentioned that, we showed footage of her video 'Pound the Alarm,' which was shot in her native birth country, Trinidad and Tobago, and features Nicki Minaj performing at a national Trinidad and Tobago Carnival in a traditional Carnival outfit."
"While our intention was not to call her culture tacky, we fully realize that the juxtaposition and choice/timing of video was in poor taste. It more or less went unnoticed for years, but then and now, it was a poor choice," they admitted.
They went on addressing the backlash, "We initially addressed the matter by apologizing, wanting to leave the original 2015 video up for full context, but then some asked why we didn't take it down, so we did. Then people wonder if we took it down to 'hide' what happened, so we felt addressing it all here. While no offense was intended, we do apologize how it looks to some, and are sorry for any disrespect, intended or not!"
Nicki herself has not responded to the video in question.
