Iggy Azalea has had her share of ups and downs, and in a new interview with GQit's clear she's hoping for an eventual comeback after a scrapped album, canceled tour, and a label switch to Island Records she referred to as "special."
Of the discussions around Iggy's success, the most prominent has always been that of appropriation and white privilege in the context of hip hop, and the Australian-born rapper tackles it head-on. "I understand that in America there is institutionalized racism and there is privilege that comes with the color of your skin," she says. "I want you to acknowledge my work and [to understand] that this wasn't easy but I also don't want to detract from or trivialize any people of colors' position because that's legitimate." Iggy maintains not only that the public's refusal to acknowledge her past success is due to her being "a white woman from Australia," but that she herself has not exactly benefited from privilege due to her working-class upbringing. "I don't wanna say that everyone's feelings about racial privilege are invalid ‘cause I was poor. But how do we have a conversation where I'm not discrediting either scenario?”
After a Twitter firestorm that saw legendary rapper and producer Q-Tip offer Iggy a multi-tweet rap history lesson, the "Fancy" rapper hasn't done much to demonstrate she understands the implications of the music she makes or the issues that impact the culture that birthed it. She's been notoriously quiet in discussions about police brutality and anti-blackness in general when many feel she should be using her platform to highlight these things. In the interview, she defends her lack of a political stance on self-preservation, but implies the issues indeed matter to her."I'm not trying to go to a protest where they're arresting celebrities and making an example of them because I'll get deported," she explained. "I understand why people criticize that because I have a voice in hip-hop. I make 'black' music. I don't want people to think it's not something I care about."
In the interview, Iggy also talks about the difficulty of dealing with her very public breakup with ex-fiance Nick Young, revealing she found out about his infidelity while on set as a judge for The X Factor Australia. "I was sitting there for hours listening to people sing asking, ‘Did anybody call my phone?'" Azalea also explained that her most recent single "Savior" was her way of potentially appealing to public empathy. "I'm strong and I'm tough but I don't wanna be a cartoon. I wanna be a person. How can I show that I'm human?"
Read the full interview here.
