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Gina Rodriguez Apologizes Amid Backlash For Saying The N-Word On Instagram

Gina Rodriguez Apologizes Amid Backlash For Saying The N-Word On Instagram

Gina Rodriguez has apologized — twice — for singing along to a Fugees verse that includes the N-word in a video she posted on Instagram. Gina Rodriguez attends the Disney+ press line at the 2019 D23 Expo on Friday, Aug. 23, 2019, in Anaheim, Calif. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)

“Jane the Virgin” actress Gina Rodriguez has apologized — twice — for singing along to a Fugees verse that includes the N-word in a video she posted on Instagram. She was singing along to the Fugees’s “Ready or Not” and recited the racial slur as she sat in a makeup chair.

Soon after she deleted the short video. In its place she posted for her first apology.

Rodriguez  said: “I am sorry if I offended anyone by singing along to The Fugees, to a song I love that I grew up on.” But many said the apology fell short as she actually didn’t apologize for using the racial slur.

So she issued a second apology and said: “The word I sang, carries with it a legacy of hurt and pain that I cannot even imagine. Whatever consequences I face for my actions today, none will be more hurtful than the personal remorse I feel.”

“I have some serious learning and growing to do and I am so deeply sorry for the pain I have caused,” she added, according to Time.

Many weren’t surprised by the actress’s racist slip. 

“The ‘gotcha!’ vibe was strong on Twitter, where Rodriguez became a trending topic, with many users literally reacting with variants of ‘we finally got you,’ alluding to the actor’s history of controversial moments regarding race,” Vox reported

It isn’t the first time Rodriguez has said something questionable about race.

In 2017 she tweeted what some considered a response to the predominantly Black cast of the Marvel film “Black Panther,” when she questioned where the Latinx actors were in Hollywood blockbusters.

“Marvel and DC are killing it in inclusion and women but where are the Latinos?! Asking for a friend…” Rodriguez tweeted. The tweet has since been deleted.

Then in September 2018 Rodriguez shocked many with her comments during a press run for the animated film “Smallfoot” when she and her co-star Yara Shahidi were interviewed by entertainment journalist Blogxilla. Blogxilla said to Shahidi that she was an inspiration to “so many Black women.”

“So many women,” Rodriguez interjected, at which point Blogxilla, who is Black, explained that “for Black women, we need people on a whole ‘nother level.” Rodriguez’s critics accused her as trying to redirect a conversation about Black identity.

In yet another incident, Rodriguez and Latina actor America Ferrera co-hosted a Latina “power lunch” whose attendees were mainly light-skinned with Rosario Dawson being the only Afro-Latina woman invited.

And, in November 2018, Rodriguez “incorrectly claimed while participating in a roundtable discussion about diversity and pay equity in Hollywood that Black and Asian actresses are paid more in Hollywood than Latina actresses,” Vox reported.

Due to the backlash of those statements, Rodriguez subsequently appeared on the radio show “Sway in the Morning,” and through tears she described the reaction as “devastating.”