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Cardi B: The Black Girl Who Beat Taylor Swift On The Charts

Cardi B

Black Women in Entertainment

Cardi B: The Black Girl Who Beat Taylor Swift On The Charts

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Cardi B took on a corporate hit-making machine and won — for the culture.

This was some black girl shit.

In front of a raucous crowd tucked into the lobby of Atlantic Records’ New York office on Monday, Cardi B, newly minted as the first female rapper in 19 years to top the Billboard Hot 100 without any other credited artists, set her champagne flute on the stairs and shouted out her community.

“All of my friends, everybody I grew up with, my family, my gang — everybody posted so I could go number one,” she said. “Everyday harassing they followers like ‘Make sure you download and stream Bodak Yellow!’” Then she hit a slight whine and started dancing and crooning: “And ‘look what you made me do, look what you made me do, look what you made me do.’ Oh my God! I’m so excited!”

She’d knocked Taylor Swift off the top of the charts, and now she was spiking the football, by quoting the song that hers had supplanted: “Look What You Made Me Do.”

And look what Cardi had done: a non-respectable black girl from the hood, talking in a thick Santo-Domingo-by-way-of-the South-Bronx accent, had booted the biggest name in music from the No. 1 spot, overcoming a corporate marketing campaign designed to ensure Taylor’s song dominated the charts. “Bodak Yellow” is an anthem dedicated to the grit, perseverance and triumph of black womanhood, and in hitting No. 1 over Swift’s expression of betrayal, the story of the song fulfilled the aspirations of its lyrics.  

To understand why this is a win for black women, you have to understand why people don’t like Taylor Swift. During her acceptance speech for Album of the Year at the 2016 Grammys, Swift addressed a verse in Kanye West’s song “Famous.”

For all my Southside niggas that know me best
I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex
Why? I made that bitch famous (Goddamn)
I made that bitch famous

The verse references the moment when West infamously interrupted Swift’s acceptance speech for Best Female Video at the 2009 VMAs. And Swift used one of her biggest …

Please read original article- Cardi B: The Black Girl Who Beat Taylor Swift On The Charts

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I am a future butterfly at the stage of growth when I am turning into an adult. I am enclosed in a hard case shell formed by love, family, and friends. It is the hardest stage of becoming a black butterfly. You will encounter many hardships only to come out stronger and better than what you went in. At this stage, you are finding out who you truly are and how to love yourself.

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