For the past two-and-a-half weeks, the name DaBaby constantly appears in tabloids because of his “loud” performance at Rolling Loud Miami on July 24. In a nutshell, the rapper spoke about LGBTQ+ community, women, and people with HIV/AIDS saying, “If you don’t show up today with HIV/AIDS, or any of them deadly transmitted diseases that’ll make you die in two-three weeks, then put your cell phone lighter up. Ladies, if your p**** smell like water, put your cell phone lighter up. Fellas, if you ain’t sucking d*** in the parking lot, put your cell phone lighter up.” To say that the crowd and live stream viewers were shocked means to say the least, and the reaction started spreading across social media immediately, calling everyone to cancel the artist.
As soon as DaBaby found out that people on the Internet weren’t happy with his performance, he couldn’t keep himself from answering, using Instagram Stories to record 19 videos of him speaking (which have already disappeared). The highlights of the videos include him saying, “What me and my fans do at the live show, it don’t concern you all n***** on the internet or you bitter bi**** on the internet. It’s not y’all’s business. What I do at a live show is for the live show… My gay fans don’t got f***ing with AIDS, stupid a** n*****. The don’t got AIDS. My gay fans, they take care of themselves. They ain’t no nasty gay n*****…They aint no junkies in the street… They got class… They ain’t sucking no d*** in no parking lot,” and so on.
The rapper tried to point out that people who didn’t attend the show have no rights to discuss it (seems like Rolling Loud’s organizers didn’t notify him about the live stream), that they twisted his words. He went on to say that he said nothing homophobic but tried to point out that his gay fans have “class,” therefore they can’t catch the disease.
The first public person who commented DaBaby’s words was Dua Lipa, who had the rapper on the remix of her song “Levitating,” released in 2020. “I’m surprised and horrified at DaBaby’s comments…I know where my heart lies and that I stand 100% with the LGBTQ community”, said the singer.
