How Rapper Nicki Minaj Became a Darling of Conservative Media
Dancing with Absurdity About Vaccines
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What does a superstar Black rapper need to do to get celebrated on Fox News?
Before last week, I would have said nothing, because I couldn’t have imagined circumstances under which Fox pundits would sing the praises of someone like Nicki Minaj.
How wrong I would have been.
Minaj, one of the best-selling female singers of all time, tweeted this on September 13:
“My cousin in Trinidad won’t get the vaccine cuz his friend got it & became impotent. His testicles became swollen. His friend was weeks away from getting married, now the girl called off the wedding. So just pray on it and make sure you’re comfortable with your decision, not bullied.”
Social media madness ensued, mostly anti-Minaj.
With almost 23 million followers on Twitter and 158 million on Instagram, the rapper is one of the most powerful people on the internet. She has greater social media reach than any Black celebrity other than The Rock and Beyoncé. Yes, she has more followers on Twitter and Instagram combined than former President Obama or Oprah Winfrey.
As a result, the health minister of Trinidad and Tobago felt compelled to immediately investigate her claims.
In a press conference two days after the tweet, Dr. Terrence Deyalsingh explained that enlarged testicles are not a side effect of COVID vaccines and that investigators found no evidence of the impotence case Minaj claimed existed. “We unfortunately wasted so much time yesterday running down this false claim,” he said.
So, is everyone condemning Minaj’s tweet?
In a rational world, you’d think this would be a clear-cut case where the right and the left could agree in criticizing an irresponsible celebrity spreading dangerous misinformation.
Oh, but you’d be wrong too.
Politics and pandering to an audience seem to trump common sense and civic responsibility every time these days among pundits on both extremes.
Who’s pandering to anti-vaxxers?
Politics and pandering were the name of the game on Larry Kudlow’s Fox Business show on Sunday, September 19.
Former President Donald Trump with then National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow during a White House event on Oct. 31, 2018. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
At first, I thought former President Trump’s director of the National Economic Council was just using Minaj as a tool to slam the Biden administration because of her claim that the White House reneged on an invitation for her to visit.
Nope. Kudlow and his guests quickly moved past that and started praising Minaj and her tweet.
Wait … Fox News is singing Minaj’s praises?
In case you don’t know Minaj’s music, some of her songs and videos include racial and homophobic slurs. She has also rapped about blow jobs, penises, vaginas (a much less polite word for them), riding men like a whore, and “stupid hoes.” At times, she has also glorified violence.
I’d bet my house few at Fox News have Minaj’s music on their playlists.
Under normal circumstances, she’d be an ideal target for Fox’s culture warriors.
But not now, because Minaj was suddenly on their side, so the Kudlow show proceeded to canonize St. Nicki.
What did they say?
Kudlow’s guest, former Fox contributor and Trump Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Monica Crowley, began the segment by saying that Minaj “raised some very legitimate questions in a Tweet.”
What exactly was legitimate, Monica? Imaginary swollen testicles that didn’t make some fictional person in Trinidad impotent?
Monica Crowley speaking at the Friends Of The Israel Defense Forces 2014 Western Region Gala at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, California on Nov. 6, 2014. (Photo by Tiffany Rose/WireImage/Getty Images)
Crowley continued: “She never advised anyone not to take the vaccine.”
Oh, Monica. You are way too smart to not know better.
If telling people that the vaccine made someone impotent doesn’t frighten people into avoiding vaccination, I don’t know what will.
Seriously. Which of the following statements from a big celebrity is more likely to stop you from getting a vaccine?
“Don’t get the vaccine.”
“The vaccine made a family friend impotent.”
The latter, obviously. Unless you really don’t want to have children.
It’s all about “bullying”?
According to them. Crowley kept defending Minaj: “All she did was raise a couple of questions and she said just think about it, pray on it, and don’t be bullied into any kind of medical decision for your personal health.”
Nobody likes bullying, so that’s what Fox folks are harping on.
On his show, Tucker Carlson also complained about bullying in defending Minaj’s tweet, saying “our media and public health officials didn’t like [it] because they make their livings bullying people.”
Actually, no, Tucker, they make a living by saving people’s lives. Remember the smallpox, measles, polio, flu, tetanus, mumps, diphtheria, and chickenpox vaccines, Tucker? They have likely saved hundreds of millions of lives.
That’s what public health officials really do. They help develop, produce, and distribute lifesaving medications that allow modern life.
And who exactly is bullying us? The oh-so-scary Dr. Fauci, who’s become the bogeyman of the right?
It’s “fascism”?
So says Crowley: “[Minaj] walked into a hornets’ nest of leftist fascism.”
Huh? Limited vaccine mandates are leftist fascism? If so, I ask these conservative pundits, why have Republican presidents allowed vaccine mandates for other diseases?
The “research” excuse
Kudlow also defended Minaj: “She wants to do her own research too ... She never said don’t get it, she’s worried about impotency and some other things … All she’s doing is asking questions.”
Please. First, she’s had plenty of time to do her own research. Extensive studies in the U.S. and elsewhere have proven the safety of the vaccines. More than 6 billion doses have been administered worldwide, almost 400 million in the U.S. alone, with minimal significant side effects.
Second, as mentioned above, if telling people that the vaccine supposedly gave someone swollen testicles and made them impotent isn’t telling people not to get the vaccine, what is?
Finally, she not just “asking questions,” she’s spreading lies. I guess that’s OK if the lies are something that pander to your audience.
Bizarro world of punditry
When did these pundits speak out against other vaccines? Most hadn’t. In fact, many conservative pundits had rightfully attacked the often liberal anti-vaxxers before COVID. But now that many anti-vaxxers are in Trump’s base, suddenly vaccines are the problem, instead of the solution.
In this bizarro world we live in, Cedric the Entertainer was making fun of the Minaj tweet at the Emmys on the same night Kudlow and his guests were praising the hip hop artist.
Confounding conservative contradictions
The hypocrisy from the right-wing pundits on vaccines seems endless.
Conservatives are supposed to believe in fiscal responsibility. They oppose wasteful government spending and the higher taxes needed to pay for it.
But they conveniently ignore the fact that people who refuse to get vaccinated are costing the U.S. billions of dollars every month.
New analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Peterson Center of Healthcare estimates that almost 300,000 hospitalizations of unvaccinated Americans between June and August have cost $5.7 billion.
Project those costs through today, and they exceed $7 billion. And that doesn’t even didn’t include outpatient treatment, which would make the costs soar even further.
Who’s paying for it? Not just patients. All Americans are paying for them, through taxpayer-funded public programs and higher insurance premiums.
It’s amazing how fiscal responsibility is the first thing sacrificed by pundits and politicians when it becomes inconvenient.
Minaj digs a deeper hole
Caught in her likely lie, the singer lashed out at both the White House and journalists, shamefully posting the personal details of two reporters who attempted to contact members of Minaj’s family in Trinidad as they tried to find the “impotent” man.
On Instagram, Minaj attacked one: “Sharlene Rampersad B***H YOUR DAYS ARE F*****G NUMBERED YOU DIRTY HOE.”
Of course, the reporters received numerous threats.
So, yes, someone who threatens and endangers reporters is lionized by partisans at a news organization.
What now?
Minaj now says she will probably get the vaccine before she goes on tour.
Too little, too late.
The African American community continues to have the highest percentage of vaccine hesitancy. Minaj’s tweet can only suppress the Black vaccination rate even further.
Is it too much to ask for superstar influencers to use their platforms to help the world, not confuse it?
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Cover photo: Nicki Minaj performs on stage during the MTV EMAs 2018 in Bilbao, Spain on Nov. 4, 2018. (Jeff Kravitz/Film Magic/Getty Images)