Lil Nas X has made it very clear that he does not care about homophobes wringing their hands over his Nicki Minaj costume.
The singer, rapper, No. 1 record holder, children’s book author, and Gen Z queer icon broke the internet over the weekend when he recreated one look from Minaj’s 2011 “Super Bass” video. On Friday evening, he shared multiple photos of himself on social media dressed in full drag, bold makeup, a two-toned wig, a form-fitting pink leopard print bodysuit, heels, and fake breasts. He captioned the images with “NAS MARAJ,” referencing the handle to his old Nicki Minaj fan account that he denied having, until he finally confirmed back in June that he was, indeed, a “barb” (a.k.a. a Nicki Minaj stan). The photos have since accumulated over one million likes on Instagram and more than 480,000 likes on Twitter.
Despite the fact that Lil Nas X objectively won Halloween, some homophobes crawled out of their caves to criticize the costume. New York rapper Dave East reposted the viral photos and called Lil Nas a “bati mon,” which seemed to be a misspelling of the slur “batty mon,” a derogatory term in Jamaican patois for a queer man. Lil Nas, completely unbothered, quote-tweeted a screenshot of the vitriol and merely replied, “It’s ‘batty man’ n****s can’t even be homophobic the proper way smh butchering the hell out of the patois.”
Shortly afterwards, he tweeted, “Bro i don’t bother a soul in this industry. all i do is tweet and make bangers. leave me alone damn.” He continued responding to critics through Monday, when he posted a meme that portrays his haters as homophobes who claim that the rapper is “part of the agenda to emasculate the Black male.” In contrast, a calm and wise-looking figure can be seen saying, “lol he killed that,” in response to the Halloween costume.
Lil Nas also nonchalantly took down a Twitter user who claimed that “the Bible says that a man is not supposed to wear anything that pertains to a woman.” In a since-deleted tweet, he simply responded: “with all due respect that’s not my problem, it’s yours.”
See more of Lil Nas X’s brilliant tweets, as well as fan reactions to his costume, below.
Get the best of what’s queer. Sign up for our weekly newsletter here.
