A pop star is doubling down on comments blasting parents who allow their children to undergo gender transition procedures. In a Saturday night interview on VladTV, singer-songwriter Ne-Yo addressed the transgender agenda, explaining, “I just personally come from an era where a man was a man and a woman was a woman, and there wasn’t but two genders, and that’s just how I rock. Now you could identify as a goldfish if you feel it.” The pop singer continued, “I don’t care, that ain’t my business, it becomes my business when you try to make me play the game with you. I’m not gonna call you a goldfish, but you wanna be a goldfish? You go be a goldfish.”
Ne-Yo went further, condemning parents who allow their children to undergo irreversible gender transition procedures. “I feel like parents have almost forgotten what the role of a parent is,” he said. “If your little boy comes to you and says, ‘Daddy, I wanna be a girl,’ and you just let him rock with that? He’s five. … When did it become a good idea to let a five-year-old, a six-year-old, a twelve-year-old make a life-changing decision for their self?”
The rapper faced backlash for his comments and an apology was published on his Twitter page, reading in part, “I’d like to express my deepest apologies to anyone that I may have hurt with my comments on parenting and gender identity.” The post concluded, “Gender identity is nuanced and I can honestly admit that I plan to better educate myself on the topic…” But Ne-Yo doubled down on his original comments in a video first posted to Instagram:
“I normally don’t give too much of a d--n about what you all think about what I do, what you have to say about what I say or whatever — and I normally don’t care because, like I said, opinions ain’t special, everybody got one. However, this is something I feel very strongly on and I need y’all to hear this from the horse’s mouth, not the publicist’s computer. … First and foremost, I do not apologize for having an opinion on this matter. I am a 43-year-old heterosexual man raising five boys and two girls, okay? That’s my reality. Now if my opinion offended somebody, yeah sure, I apologize for you being offended because that wasn’t my intention. My intention is never to offend anybody. … However, if somebody asks my opinion on this matter — and this is how I feel — I will never be okay with allowing a child to make a decision that detrimental to their life.”
Alluding to the apology posted on Twitter, Ne-Yo added in his video, “I definitely plan to educate myself a little more in this matter, however, I doubt that there is any book anywhere or any opinion that somebody’s gonna tell me that’s gonna make me okay with letting a child make a decision like that.”
Ne-Yo also noted that he isn’t afraid of being “cancelled” over his comments:
“If I get cancelled for this, then you know what? Maybe this is a world where they don’t need a Ne-Yo no more, alright? And I ain’t got no problem with that, I’m a hustler, I’ll figure it out, I’ve got kids to raise and I’m gonna do that regardless.”
Ne-Yo had previously addressed cancel culture during his VladTV appearance, saying, “I just don’t know when the world became so sensitive. Like, comedians can’t tell jokes no more, everybody gets offended.” He said some people find jokes or comments on such subjects “triggering,” continuing to say that such people should “sit in your house by yourself.” Mainstream media outlets like USA Today have classified Ne-Yo’s comments as “transphobia.”
S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.
