Nicki Minaj walks out on New York Times Magazine interview
Nicki Minaj has a very clear message for everyone: Don't mess with me.
That goes to Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus and now, journalists.
Minaj admonished a writer for the New York Times Magazine and said, "Do not speak to me like I'm stupid or beneath you in any way." The interview was subsequently cut off, leaving the interviewer, Vanessa Grigoriadis, feeling stunned and even that Minaj was "right in calling [her] out."
The interview started off well, with Minaj animatedly talking about Instagram, self-image and feminism. She even opened up on her feud with Cyrus:
"The fact that you feel upset about me speaking on something that affects black women makes me feel like you have some big balls," said the hip-hop star. "You're in videos with black men, and you're bringing out black women on your stages, but you don't want to know how black women feel about something that's so important? Come on, you can't want the good without the bad. If you want to enjoy our culture and our lifestyle, bond with us, dance with us, have fun with us, twerk with us, rap with us, then you should also want to know what affects us, what is bothering us, what we feel is unfair to us. You shouldn't not want to know that."
But things soon took a wrong turn after Grigoriadis asked Minaj about the feud between Drake and Minaj's boyfriend Meek Mill, and the beef between Lil Wayne and Young Thug. That's when Grigoriadis unleashed the interview-killing question:
"Is there a part of you that thrives on drama, or is it no, just pain and unpleasantness -- "
Minaj stood up and reacted sharply, calling the interviewer "disrespectful."
"What do the four men you just named have to do with me thriving off drama?'" she asked. "That's the typical thing that women do. What did you putting me down right there do for you? Women blame women for things that have nothing to do with them ... To put down a woman for something that men do, as if they're children and I'm responsible, has nothing to do with you asking stupid questions, because you know that's not just a stupid question. That's a premeditated thing you just did."
The singer went on to call Grigoriadis "rude" and "a troublemaker" and then finally said, "'I don't care to speak to you anymore," ending the interview.
Grigoriadis closed her article with the admission: "Even though I had no intention of putting her down as a small-minded or silly woman, she was right to call me out."
