Music

Sia Semi-Apologises For Weird Black Lives Matter Tweets After Mixing Up Nicki Minaj And Cardi B

"Can I just like you both?", she wrote, missing the point completely.

by Jared Richards  15 June 2020
Sia criticised for odd tweets about Cardi B, Nicki Minaj and Black Lives Matter

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Sia has apologised for an odd string of tweets made after confusing a photo of Nicki Minaj for Cardi B, in which she suggests outrage over her mistake was a distraction from the Black Lives Matter movement and told both rappers to not think about their ‘feud’.

It began when one of Sia’s fans tweeted a photo of Minaj in a Sia-esque bob over the weekend, asking when the two would collaborate. Despite the photo and the original tweet including Minaj’s Twitter handle, Sia responded (in now-deleted tweets) by saying that she’d love to collab with Cardi B.

Given the long racist tendency for people to mistake BIPOC people for one another despite them looking nothing alike, Sia’s mistake was immediately criticised, prompting a series of odd responses from Sia in which she shrugged off the criticism, and asked people to focus on “real news”.

In a now-deleted tweet (saved by HighSnobriety), she wrote, “Dudes. I also like @MissNikkiiBaby I don’t give a shit about feuds, George Floyd was fucking murdered Breonna Taylor. Murdered. Come on let’s rise in unity. You think @iamcardib and Nikki are so petty that they would want you focusing on a silly feud instead of REAL NEWS?”

In the tweet, she also tagged the wrong account, instead of @NickiMinaj. She then tweeted directly at the two rappers who had not chimed in on the mistake, seemingly asking them to rein in their fans who are creating a “fake feud” where Sia sides with one rapper over the other. Cardi B and Minaj have had a long-standing ‘beef’ over the years which she’s referencing.

“Hey @iamcardib @NICKIMINAJ you aren’t thinking about a feud right now are you?,” she wrote. “We are focused on the problem of systemic racism.”

She then deleted all these tweets and wrote a final follow-up, apologising and saying her misunderstanding saw her “make a buffoon out of myself.” She also asked if she was allowed to just like both rappers, missing the point entirely.

Neither Minaj or Cardi B have acknowledged Sia’s multiple tweets to them.