A Letter to the Girl Behind Nicki Minaj’s Persona

My grandmother used to say the devil comes to kill, steal and destroy. This administration has done all three. And now Nicki Minaj has pulled up a chair at that table. Where I’m from, we’d say she’s eating the devil’s pie. In 2018 she told the world she came here as an undocumented child at five. Now she tells young people to “vote red” and stands on command while the President objectifies her body to a cheering crowd. She is wrong, and she will answer for her choices. But we cannot do the devil’s bidding. He will use her, take the meat and throw the bones to the dogs. Our job is not to destroy her. It is to correct her and call her back to her higher self. So I want to speak to someone else.

Dear Onika,

I am not writing to Barbie or to the self-proclaimed Queen of Rap. I am writing to the gifted little Brown girl in Saint James, five years old, waiting with her grandmother while her parents made a way in New York.

You once said you thought being rich would fix everything. Now you have the fame and the wealth, and you are still vulnerable in this country because of who you are. Before your family had wealth, they had protection through public policy. Somebody let your family in. A public school in Queens taught you. A performing arts high school trained your gift. A legal pathway let you stay. They are the same doors the man you call your president is working to shut.

I know you have carried a lot. Your father, the fire, the fear in that house, the dark road where you lost him. Your brother. Your marriage. The citizenship you still do not have. I know there is bitterness, and a deep sense of betrayal. Don’t let this moment force you to wear it. Someone once saw possibility in you. Don’t close that door on others.

So here is the hard truth. Your fear is being turned into a weapon, and you are holding it. The same machine that preys on your fear is spreading fear to other families. Right now there are five-year-olds, just like you were, being pulled from their parents’ arms. When you stand on that stage, you are standing with the people doing it. Think of that little girl in Saint James. Then think of them.

You do not have to stand up on command when a man tells a crowd to look at your body. When he told you to stand, I thought of the auction block. Millions of our foremothers were ordered to stand, turn around and be examined, their bodies judged and priced by men who did not see them as fully human. That history lives in us. You did not deserve that treatment. No one does.

You are not a chess piece in his game or a spectacle for a crowd to gawk at. You know the name Sarah Baartman. White men put her body on display across Europe and called it entertainment. It was degrading then. It is degrading now. He loves to call things fake. Here is what is fake: the idea that standing beside you proves he has Black friends.

But hear me. Just as he has no right to exploit your vulnerabilities, you have no right to exploit the vulnerabilities of the people who made you. They built your fame and your wealth. They are the ones his racist policies and harmful economic agenda are targeting now. Do not spend their trust to buy his favor.

If you believe in God the way you say you do, you know your source is not this man or this country. Your gift made room for you. Why put it in service to those who only steal, kill and destroy? Not even American citizenship is worth the surrender of your soul.

And think about your son, a beautiful Black boy growing up in this country. He will grow up with famous parents and money. But just as your fame and wealth have not protected you, they will not protect him. You have the power of choice, and you will answer for the choices you make. Our children, and their children, will carry the weight of them.

Some of us still believe in repentance and redemption. Redemption is not a punishment. It is a homecoming. And correction is love.

That five-year-old girl is still in there. She is still worth protecting. She is still worthy of being seen.

We see you, Onika. Remember who you are. It is time to check Nicki Minaj, the character, and stop letting her take you down this road. If you won’t do it for anyone else, do it for that gifted five-year-old girl, for your son, and for the millions of children who deserve what you deserved: a brighter future, free of racism, fear and meanness. Reclaim your humanity and your power.

With clarity and love,

LaTosha Brown

To the Barbz

To the Barbz, and to everyone who has loved her music: loving her does not mean cosigning this. If we truly love her, we hold her to her highest self. We don’t cancel people. We correct them and hold them accountable. That is how a community moves forward. So let’s be clear. She was wrong. And because we love her, we will not pretend otherwise. Love that cannot tell the truth ain’t love at all.