Madonna, 63, is speaking out after 50 Cent, 46, publicly apologized for mocking photos of her posing in lingerie earlier this month. The singer called the rapper’s apology “fake” and explained the reason for her feelings in a video she posted to Instagram on Dec. 10. She also ultimately said she forgives him and hopes “one day” he’ll see “a different point of view.”
In the clip, Madonna rocked a filter that made her face animated with massive bright blue eyes and inflated lips and appeared to be sitting down in a chair while getting her hair styled. After saying she felt 50 was “trying to shame” and “humiliate” her, she went on about her thoughts on his apology, which he posted after she reacted to the mockery, in a now-deleted tweet on Dec. 2.
“Yeah, your apology is fake. It’s bulls*** and it’s not valid,” she said in the video. “Let me just hit those four, five points about your apology being invalid.”
Since in his apology, 50 wrote that Madonna was “hurt” by the mockery because she “dug up” a throwback photo of the two of them hanging out shortly after, the “Like a Virgin” crooner’s latest response first touched upon the pic she shared when calling him out the first time.
“Number one, it’s not hard to find footage of you and me hanging out,” she continued in the video before showing footage of them hanging out from BET, including a moment in which he called her an “old friend of mine.”
“Number two, an apology is not valid if you don’t know what you’re apologizing for. What you should be apologizing for is your misogynistic, sexist, ageist behavior and remarks,” she went on in her video. “Number three, you didn’t hurt my feelings ‘cause I don’t take it personally. I could never take it personally ‘cause you’re not coming from an enlightened place.”
“Number four, you say that you’re not benefiting from it,” she added. “Of course you’re benefiting from it. That is what social media is all about. You do understand that, right? We post things about ourselves and we use Instagram and other forms of social media because we want attention. We want people to buy our products. We want people to invest in our brands. We want people to listen to our music. We want people to go to our concerts. We want people to notice us. We want people to like us.”
“There’s nothing wrong with any of those things but don’t kid yourself if you think you have an Instagram account and you’re not benefiting from it. Shut it down. Stop lying to yourself,” she continued to point out. “your reposting somebody else’s low-level-of-consciousness posting that are meant to shame and humiliate other people – that’s f***ed up.”
The talented songstress concluded with a few words about her forgiveness. “You are trying to put a limit on when women should be able to feel good about themselves. So finally I just wanna say: I forgive you and I hope that one day you wake up and see a different point of view,” she said. “I wish you all the best. That’s it, okay?”
In addition to the words she spoke in the video, Madonna captioned it with, “Delayed Clap back for 50 cent And his fake apology ….…..,..Ive been busy, better late then never!!! Had. some things I needed to say.”
Madonna’s video comes after 50 apologized for comparing one of her posted lingerie pics to a pic of the Wicked Witch of the East’s legs under Dorothy’s house in The Wizard of Oz. His apology was a direct response to her own response of the mockery, which included the throwback photo of the two of them along with the caption, “Here is 50 Cent pretending to be my friend. Now you have decided to talk smack about me. I guess your new career is getting attention by trying to humiliate others on social media. The least elevated choice you could make as an artist and an adult.”
“I must have hurt Madonna feelings, she went and dug up a [sic] old MTV photo from 03,” 50 wrote in his apology tweet. “Ok Im sorry i did not intend to hurt your feelings.I don’t benefit from this in anyway i said what i thought when i saw the picture because of where i had seen it before i hope you accept my apology.”