There Are No Girls on the Internet - Nicki Minaj, WTF are you doing?

Episode Date: September 16, 2021

We needed an emergency episode aboutNicki Minaj using her massive platforms to irresponsibly spread fictions about the COVID vaccine.Nicki Minaj and Husband Sued, Accusedof Harassing Sexual Assault Victim: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/13/arts/music/nicki-minaj-kenneth-petty-lawsuit.htmlMyths and Facts about COVID-19 Vaccinesfrom the CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/facts.html Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Hey, all, just a quick heads up. This episode contains mentions of rape. There Are No Girls on the Internet is a production of IHeart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet. So we spent the last year having conversations about the harm that myths and disinformation can cause in our communities. And I always like to keep those conversations really centered around institutions, because as we know, the spread of false claims online is systemic. It isn't usually about one person.

It's usually about a system that empowers that person to spread. dangerous lies and amplify them. But sometimes one person really does need to be called out. Can you guess who it is? Let's talk about Nikki Minaj. So here's what's going on. This week, fans asked Nikki Minaj why she wasn't going to the Met Gallup. And she tweeted that she wasn't going because the Met Gallagher required vaccinations from COVID. She tweeted, if I get vaccinated, it won't be for the Met. It'll be once I feel I've done enough research. I'm working on that now. In the meantime, my loves, be safe. Wear the mask with two strings that grip your head and face.

Now, when folks on Twitter started pushing back, she tweeted, My cousin and Trinidad won't get the vaccine because his friend got it and became impotent. His testicles became swollen. His friend was weeks away from getting married. And now the girl called off the wedding. So just pray on it and make sure that you're comfortable with your decision, not bullied. This is when all hell broke loose. Trinidad's health minister even had to step in and say that this is not true

and that there were no reports of impotence or swollen testicles after having had the COVID-19 vaccine. It isn't even a known side effect. And his response really reveals a big part about why disinformation is actually so dangerous. At a time when COVID is impacting this community hard, their health minister had to take time from his research and work to respond to completely untrue claims that Nikki Minaj irresponsibly spread to her over 20 million followers. Here's what he had to say in a press conference. There has been no such reported either side effect or adverse event.

It wasted our time yesterday, trying to track down, because we take all these claims seriously. Now, he's articulating one of the real costs of misinformation. It takes up so much oxygen in the room. It means that time spent that should be focusing on real threats that exist during a global pandemic has to be wasted and diverted to debunking lies and false claims. Dr. Fauci even weighed in saying, I'm not blaming her for anything, but she should be thinking twice about propagating information that really has no basis except as a one-off anecdote. And that's not what science is all about. So basically, as pretty much everybody learned in middle school, if somebody tells you a story that starts with my cousin's friend, whatever you're about to hear is probably bullshit.

Nikki later went to Instagram to say that she was locked out of her Twitter account, implying that it was because she was just asking questions about the vaccine. But let's be real, she was not just asking questions and really pay attention to how expertly she obscured what she actually did on Twitter. And it makes it seem like the powers that be are trying to silence her for just asking innocent questions about the vaccine. When that's not what she was doing at all. She was repeating a false claim about the vaccine leading to swollen testicles and impotence to 20 million people. Repeating false claims and just asking questions are two completely different things. So we know that there are two big groups who are elsewhere. for the COVID-19 vaccine, but haven't yet gotten it. You've got your diehard anti-vaxxers who are

pretty much unlikely to ever be vaccinated no matter what. And people who are not necessarily traditionally anti-vax, but maybe have questions or just hesitant about the vaccine. And that second group is who experts agree that we should be focusing on right now to encourage them to get vaccinated because they're actually movable. So Nikki's tweets are really endangering that second group because they're going to hear her completely untrue, now viral claim based on on a one-off anecdote about the vaccine side effects and think, hmm, maybe I shouldn't get this vaccine after all if it's causing swollen balls and impotence. And this is also where I think fan culture can really play a part in propping up and spreading misinformation. Some of you all

may or may not know, Nikki Minaj has a very intense fan base called The Barbes. And for every black woman scientist and public health professional who was responding to her COVID-19 tweets, offering to walk her through the vaccine research, and there were actually quite a few. You know, our community really showed up to call this sister in. There were plenty of fans cheering Nikki on, thanking her for, quote, going against the establishment. Her tweets even won Nikki praise from known bad actors and disinformation super spreaders like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens. And you know when people like Candice Owens are on your side, something is up.

Like, it's time to rethink. And Nikki, for her part, was really fanning the flames of all this on social media. She tweeted a jokey little poll that asked people to rank which vaccine they like better. and offered to connect late-night TV show host, Jenny Kimmel, with her cousin's friend for the right price. And this is almost why I didn't want to talk about this at all. No, not just because I'm afraid of the barbs, but because it turns into a spectacle.

And that initial untrue claim, it's more and more powerful because it just gets more and more engagement. But I actually suspect this is kind of what Nikki wants. Because just a few days before Nikki made these tweets about the COVID vaccine, Nikki Minaj's husband, Kenneth Petty, pled guilty to failure to register as a sex offender after he moved from New York to California as a result of being convicted of first-degree attempted rape in New York in April of 1995. In this case, he pled guilty to the first-degree attempted rape charge and served four years

in a New York State prison. His victim said that in 1994, Petty raped her at knife point when they were both 16. Now, last month, his victim sued both Nikki Minaj and her husband, saying that she'd had to move multiple times because both Nikki and her husband have been harassing her, trying to force her to recant her account of the incident. So this actually gets pretty dark. The New York Times has a really in-depth piece about what happened that you can read in the show description, but the allegations in the suit are troubling and really damning, not just for her husband who was convicted of attempted rape, but also for Nikki, who the victim says offered her half a million

dollars if she recanted. She also says that Nikki offered to send a happy birthday video to her teenage daughter, quote, as a bonus. She also accuses Nikki of lying to her millions of followers about the incident. The whole thing just sounds really awful. So it's pretty interesting that in a week where big news is breaking about Nikki's husband's guilty plea in connection to his rape conviction, that we're all talking about her tweets about COVID misinformation. And that's really the power of misinformation, how it can be weaponized so easily and so effectively. It's spread so quickly and can become so powerful that it's all anyone is talking about.

And what we should be talking about is all the people who will be harmed because they were misled by dangerous and irresponsible false claims. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach us at hello at tangoady.com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangoody.com. There are no girls on the internet was created by me,

Bridget Todd. It's a production of IHeartRadio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from IHartRadio, check out the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Life is full of hurdles. So how do you keep going? On Hurtle with Emily Abadi, we're talking with the most inspiring women in sports and wellness from professional athletes, coaches, and Olympic champions about the challenges that shape them and the mindset that keeps them moving forward.

At our level, at this scale, being able to fail in front of the entire world. Like, I can do anything. I can do anything. Listen to Hurtle with Emily Abadi on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of IHart Women's Sports. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. And nobody's telling you exactly what happened.

That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. And every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the best. biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline. And we're going straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to SportsSlic. On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slicalife 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. I'm Michelle McPhee, and I've been unraveling the strangest

criminal alliance I've ever reported on. A Mormon polygamous. and an Armenian businessman. Multi-million dollar house, Ferraris and Lamborghinis, private jets, a billion dollar fraud. But how long can this alliance last? Tell me what you know. Is somebody coming after me?

Listen to Kingdom of Fraud on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHart podcast. Guaranteed Human.