Cardi B found herself on the defensive Tuesday after a video clip surfaced in which she admitted to drugging and robbing men.
“Oh my God , Cardi B is the female version of Bill Cosby!,” read one tweet, which included the hashtag “#SurvivingCardiB.”
The Instagram Live clip, recorded as her rap career was starting to take off, was in response to someone who told her she didn’t work for her success.
“I had to go strip, I had to go, ‘Oh yeah, you want to f**k me? Yeah, yeah, yeah, let’s go back to this hotel,’ and I drugged n****s up, and I robbed them. That’s what I used to do,” she said.
On Tuesday, Cardi posted a message on Instagram addressing the negative reactions on social media.
“I talked about things I had to do in my past right or wrong that I felt I needed to do to make a living,” she explained. “I never claim to be perfect or come from a perfect world wit a perfect past. I always speak my truth I always own my s**t.”
The superstar, who has 8-month-old daughter Kulture with rapper Offset, said part of hip hop culture is talking about where you came from.
“There are rappers that glorify murder violence drugs an[d] robbing. Crimes they feel they had to do to survive,” Cardi explained. “I never glorified the things I brought up in that live I never even put those things in my music because I’m not proud of it and feel a responsibility not to glorify it.
“I made the choices that I did at the time because I had very limited options.”
Cardi said the men she talked about were ones she dated and they were “conscious, willing and aware.”
While Cardi is taking heat from many people, others have her back.
“People offended that Cardi B drugged and robbed men when she worked as a stripper had no problem supporting male rappers who shot people when they worked as pimps and drug dealers,” tweeted actor Sam Kalidi.
Here’s a sampling of reactions on Twitter: