T.I. says too many people “misconstrued” and “sensationalized” what he said earlier this month about taking his daughter to the gynecologist.
The rapper sparked outrage on social media when he said he takes his daughter Deyjah Harris on “yearly trips to the gynecologist to check her hymen” to ensure she is a virgin. Appearing on the Ladies Like Us podcast, T.I. said “as of her 18th birthday, her hymen is still intact.”
In a recent conversation on Jada Pinkett Smith’s Red Table Talk show, T.I. insisted: “All of this false narrative has just been sensationalized. All of this surrounds a conversation that I was having in a very joking manner.
“When I was asked how … I deal with parenting in this day and age, I just began to, from a place of truth, I began to embellish and exaggerate and I think a lot of people kinda like took it extremely literal.”
The rap star pointed out that many people reacted without actually getting the whole story.
“Never said I was in any exam room. That is an assumption. That is a falsity,” he said. “I never said that it was being done in present-day as an 18-year-old.
“And I never said that her mother wasn’t present.”
T.I. admitted he understood why his daughter was not happy about his comments and said he was “incredibly apologetic.”
Deyjah, a first-year college student, is in control of her own body, her famous father acknowledged.
“I’m not there to protect necessarily virginity. I just know that is a big move,” he said. “Once you make that move there are things that happen that follow.”