TI Discusses Hymen Comment on Red Table Talk

Earlier this month, the rapper T.I. faced extreme backlash for his comment regarding his daughter, Deyjah. The comment came from an interview on the Ladies Like Us podcast. T.I revealed he accompanied his daughter to her yearly gynecologist visits to “check her hymen.” Many believed he was trying to control Deyjah specifically because she’s one of us his daughters and not one of his sons. Furthermore, T.I explained that he also made sure the doctor was able to tell him all her health details by having Deyjah sign release forms.

In order to clear his name, T.I appeared on Jada Pinkett-Smith’s Facebook Watch series, Red Table Talk. The episode aired November 25th, and was hosted by Jada and her mother, Adrienne Banfield-Jones. The mother-daughter hoped to bring T.I on the show to educate him on how his actions and words are so problematic, especially to Deyjah herself. Before the interrogation started, Jada gave the rapper a chance to explain his thought process. He started off by clarifying a few allegations that were brought up in the backlash.

“I never said I was in any exam room, that is an assumption. That is a falsity. I never said that it was being done present day. And I never said that her mother wasn't present,” he spoke.

He then continued by highlighting that his actions were all from the intention of protecting his daughter, not controlling her.

“I think that in the age or the time when our women, Black women, are the most unprotected, unattended, disregarded women on the planet, I’m being criticized because I’m willing to go above and beyond to protect mine and I'm talking about all of the slimy, grimey, chubby-fingered little boys who want to just come in and defile and destroy the sanctity. T.I continued, “[a]nything that is the most important thing to me in my life, I am going to deal with that with very extreme care and I don't understand how that is looked at as being so wrong."

Although it's easy to see his point of view, Jada spoke on how his actions, whether he realizes or not, fuels the patriarchy system, a system that T.I was unaware of, that are in place today. Furthermore, these same actions not being applied to his sons doesn’t help his case either. She began, "There's a patriarchal structure — it's structured by the views and outlook of men. It tends to be, at times, oppressive to the feminine journey. There's a lot that happens in the feminine journey. It's often told and seen and led through the eyes of men, who know nothing of what we're going through."

T.I also spoke on this factor of gender bias as well. In the end, he believes that the sex isn’t as life altering to his sons versus his daughters.