Pop star Doja Cat has denied allegations that she took part in racist conversations online, after her participation in alt-right chat rooms stirred a storm over the weekend.
In addition to her participation in racist chat groups, social media critics pointed to her 2015 song, Dindu Nuffin, as evidence of her questionable behavior.
The term Dindu Nuffin is thought to be mockery of black victims of police brutality.
In a lengthy Instagram post, Doja Cat responded to the social media banter and criticism “cancelling” her, saying she had used chatrooms to socialize only.
“I want to address what’s been happening on Twitter. I’ve used public chat rooms to socialize since I was a child,” the statement from the 24-year-old singer read.
“I shouldn’t have been on some of those chat room sites, but I personally have never been involved in any racist conversations. I’m sorry to everyone I offended.”
Doja Cat has previously mentioned being a part of online chatrooms: In a December 2019 interview with Paper Magazine, she admitted that she used to skip school to hang out in one particularly toxic chatroom.
“People would pick on me and use horrible, horrible language, just the worst, and I just didn’t understand why people were so crazy on there,” the singer told Paper at the time.
In her apology, Doja mentioned her own black roots. “Half of my family is black from South Africa and I’m very proud of where I come from,” her statement said.
Despite criticism of the song Dindu Nuffin, Doja said she had made it with good intentions.
“It was written in response to people who often used that term to hurt me,” the statement said. “I made an attempt to flip its meaning, but recognize that it was a bad decision to use the term in my music.”
This is not the first time Doja Cat has been “cancelled” by online critics.
In 2018, she faced a backlash for using homophobic language after her song, Mooo started gaining momentum on the charts.
Her most recent success has come from the song “Say So”, which went from a viral hit on TikTok to the remix featuring Nicki Minaj recently topping Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.
