Ever since Kanye West stormed the MTV VMA stage in protest of Taylor Swift winning Video of the Year over Beyoncé, artists have been hesitant to speak out against MTV’s award practices. But that fear seems to have died this year because not only has Nicki Minaj spoken out against the VMAs, but fellow fearless rapper Azealia Banks recently blasted the VMAs and the Grammys over racism as well.
Over the past year, Banks has been all over the Internet thanks to her high-profile beefs with Iggy Azalea, Erykah Badu, T.I., and countless others. But besides slamming other artists and blasting both the “White media” and the “White gay media” for their misogyny and racism, Banks also dropped one of the most critically acclaimed albums of 2014 when she finally released her debut project, Broke With Expensive Taste, last November.
And like Minaj, Banks dropped some of hip-hop’s most lauded videos of the past year with her slick black-and-white video for “Chasing Time” and the trippy and arctic “Ice Princess” video.
But despite the acclaim, when the nominations for the upcoming MTV VMAs dropped this week, Banks was left completely left out of any nominations for the awards show.
Not surprisingly, Banks didn’t take the snubs lying down and she decided to hop on Twitter and blast both MTV and the Grammys for snubbing Black artists.
We applaud both Minaj and Banks for pointing out the inequalities they see in the music industry and we’re intrigued to see who will be inspired by these women to speak out for Black artists as well.
