If you were on Twitter this afternoon then you should have seen lots of negative traffic.
So really quickly, Rihanna posted a parody of Teyana Taylor singing Anita Baker’s “Rapture” on Instagram.
Teyana caught wind and a one-sided Twitter war erupted. Almost at the onset, Rihanna smartly bowed out noting that she refused to give Teyana free publicity to jump-start her career.
Meanwhile Teyana went on what seemed like a black-out rampage graduating from a victim and turning into a full fledge e-bully as she physically threatened Rihanna, mocked her domestic violence incident with Chris Brown and sexually degraded her.
Here are a couple of points I want to make before I go into the morale of the story:
1.) Rihanna was insensitive/ wrong for posting such a parody. I can’s say for sure if she thought it was “HA HA” funny, or if it came from a malice place. However the end result is the same. It was perceived as hurtful. Furthermore, aren’t you busy touring the world? You just performed for 100,000 people. You should be on cloud nine, not worrying about the likes of Teyana Taylor who most people – respectfully – don’t know. It is, what it is.
2.) Rihanna bowing out of this particular Twitter war was smart not weak. She’s right. Any sort of going back-and-forth would have created a pay-day for Teyana. She would have come off as a bigger bully than what she is. Most importantly, she gave Teyana the rope to hang herself.
3.) And she did just that. Suddenly after the violent Twitter messages, I personally disregarded Rihanna’s petty parody and focused on how horrible, disrespectful and low Teyana had sank obviously in a bit of rage. It was horrible. In no shape or form, did Teyana come off as being cool or standing up for herself. She came off as obsessive and unstable.
Now my story…
Many years ago I dated this guy who at the time – as I haven’t seen him in years – was horrible. He lied, cheated, was disrespectful. For allowing that, I have to point the finger at myself, but that’s who he was. I wasn’t one for confrontation. I bottled up most of my outrage to keep the peace and I had stayed far too long in a dysfunctional relationship. That showed on the day that my anger erupted. After allegations of another woman rose I toke it upon myself to head to his apartment in a bout of rage. When I arrived, I showed my ass. I screamed, cursed, threw things. The neighbors came over. It was a fiasco. I came off as a raging, unstable lunatic. Suddenly the wrongs that had been done to me were overshadowed by my own deplorable behavior. When I walked away, I no longer felt hurt from the infidelity. I felt guilty for my own unruly actions.
What I learned and know for sure is that you are responsible for your own actions. You can’t control others and when the dust settles you have to account for your own behavior. It doesn’t matter what got you there. No one cares. We just see the last man standing. From that day on, I vowed to never allow anyone to persuade me to come outside of myself. As far as vengeance is concerned (turn away if you aren’t spiritual), that’s for the Lord to handle – not me.
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