Azealia Banks was born and raised in Harlem, New York City.
I couldn't find a thing about Banks' religious views or lack thereof. In no interviews that I found did she call herself a Christian, pagan, spiritual, atheist, agnostic, or anything in between. She went to a private Catholic school, but I couldn't find any indication that she's actually Catholic.[1]
She did, however, post this on Twitter:
I'm gods favorite child.[2]
She's all over the place on Twitter, so I couldn't quite figure out the context. But it doesn't make her sound all that pious. My best guess for Banks is that she's non-religious. If you know anything else, please let us know in the comments.
Navigating Political Correctness through Twitter
Let's get the partisan politics out of the way first. Banks is a Democrat, or at the very least she's anti-Republican. A few days before the 2012 presidential election, she posted several tweets about Mitt Romney including:
Ok so ladies… If this nigga mitt romney gets elected we gonna be in some real fucking trouble.[3]
And that was the nice one. There were no celebratory tweets after Obama won, but I'm assuming it eased her mind about the future of the country.
But partisan politics is kind of a side-note to where she's really made an impact on the political scene, and that's through her loud mouth–or loud Twitter feed, I should say.
During a Twitter spat with a fellow female rapper, gay gossip blogger Perez Hilton took sides with Banks' rival. And Banks shot this tweet back to Hilton:
omg u should just kill yourself… Like for real. lol what a messy faggot you are.[4]
In a time when the bullying of gay teens is attracting a lot of attention, that didn't sit too well with a lot of people. Banks apologized to fans she may have offended, but refused to apologize to Hilton.[5] The rapper, who identifies herself as bisexual, said she was only using the word in the context that black people use the word, "nigga." She tweeted:
If u listen to my music and are not offended by the word nigga…. We're not gonna go here with this faggot shit… We're just not.[6]
This whole question about what words who can use when got a lot of people talking. GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) condemned Banks' tweet, and then the blogosphere got all riled up with some railing her use of the word "faggot," regardless of her sexual orientation,[7] and others wondering why Banks was singled out when that and other sexual slurs are used all the time without notice.[8]
It might not be partisan politics, but it goes pretty deep into how society goes about navigating the arena of political correctness in a world where the majority are part of a minority. And sometimes it takes a loud-mouthed girl from New York to bring it out of us. What do you think?
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