The role of the role model is up for debate. Are celebrities expected to be on their best behavior at all times because fans look up to them?
Or, is it unfair to expect celebrities to give up their authentic selves just because they’re in the limelight? When Cardi B Tweeted out, “I’m just nasty like that,” a fan responded, asking the rapper to act better.
The fan wrote, “I love you ALOT but I don’t agree with the messages you’ve been sending us young girls. So many of us look at you as a role model and that should send a very loud message.”
Cardi B responded, saying she feels stifled by the role model label, “For these past two years I been watching what I say and I haven’t been myself. I been feeling [trapped] and sad cause it’s not ME but everybody tell me to be it for me to be this ‘role model’ and guess what? People still spit my past right in my face so for now imma be my old self again,” the rapper wrote.
Twitter had Cardi B’s back, Tweeting support for the rapper to be her authentic self.
Others brought up the point that a true role model is someone who is comfortable with who they are.
The rapper has never claimed to be perfect, as she frequently points out. Cardi B has made past mistakes, such as drugging and stealing from men when she was a stripper, but she has owned up to those mistakes.
“I made the choices that I did at the time because I had very limited options,” she said earlier this year. “I was blessed to have been able to rise from that but so many women have not.”
And at the end of the day, isn’t the ability to be yourself and to acknowledge your past something to look up to? We should all let Cardi B just be Cardi B.
