Sir Mix-A-Lot Defends Actor's Controversial Insta Post: 'I Was Surprised At The Criticism'

Baby Got Back rapper and producer Sir Mix-A-Lot has spoken out in defence of actor and Mrs Deadpool Blake Lively today, after she posted a red carpet image captioned, "LA face with an Oakland booty", a lyric from the popular '90s booty-appreciation song.

The Instagram post, a front and rear shot of Lively's Versace gown on the Cannes Film Festival red carpet, was criticised for being racially insensitive and offensive to black women, but Sir Mix-A-Lot (Anthony Ray) has penned an op-ed to state that he was surprised Lively copped so much flak, even though Kim Kardashian and Katy Perry had both referenced the same lyric in the past without as much vitriol. 

As Hollywood Reporter writes, Ray says, "A friend of mine, he said, "Dude, I know Katy Perry did this, one of the Kardashians did this, but I don't understand, what did this girl do to make everybody pissed off?" So I checked it out, and looked at it and I was kind of … I liked it. You know, I like stuff like that, but I was a little surprised at the criticism.

Ray goes on to explain his intentions when writing the line back in 1992. "The reason I wrote the song was because I always felt that the African-American idea of what was beautiful was shunned. If you go back and look at 1990, 1991, you only saw African-American women and Hispanic women who were either a maid or a hooker … So I wrote Baby Got Back, not to say which race is prettier — which is silly, because there were white women with the same curves that were told that they were fat, too."

 

L.A. face with an Oakland booty

A photo posted by Blake Lively (@blakelively) on May 17, 2016 at 5:04pm PDT

He pulls apart the specific meaning behind the lyric in question, too. "What I meant by "LA" was Hollywood. In other words, makeup or whatever it took to make that face look good, they do it in L.A. But, as much as you can throw makeup on something, you can't make up the butt. That's what LA face and Oakland booty meant. You can put makeup on that face and make it look beautiful, but a butt is a butt, a body is a body."

Ray says Lively's caption references that "the norm has changed, that beautiful people have accepted our idea of beautiful". 

"I think she's saying, "I've got that Oakland booty," or "I'm trying to get it." I think we have to be careful what we wish for as African-Americans, because if you say she doesn't have the right to say that, then how do you expect her at the same time to embrace your beauty? I mean, I don't get it. I think it's almost a nod of approval, and that was what I wanted. I wanted our idea of beautiful to be accepted."

Controversy has been following Lively around at Cannes, where earlier in the week she was met with distaste for defending Woody Allen, auteur and director of her film Cafe Society. She said he was "empowering to women" despite accusations of sexual assault by his daughter, Dylan Farrow.