Today is one of those days where I really regret ever deciding to follow celebrity news for a living, as rapper TI — who you’ll remember as “the guy who raps on Justin Timberlake’s song ‘My Love’ — has revealed some truly horrendous parenting choices that he’s made as a father.
While on the Ladies Like Us podcast with actress Nazanin Mandi and makeup artist Nadia Moham, they were chatting about fatherhood and whether he’d had the ‘sex talk’ with his daughters.
TI casually revealed that he takes his 18-year-old daughter Deylah to the gynecologist every year to “check her hymen”.
“Deyjah’s 18, just graduated high school now, and she’s attending her first year of college, figuring it out for herself,” he said.
“And yes, not only have we had the conversation — we have yearly trips to the gynecologist to check her hymen.”
Not done yet, the rapper continued:
“So it’s this one time we go, I think this might have been after her 16th birthday. This is what we do… Usually, like the day after the [birthday] party, she’s enjoying her gifts. I put a sticky note on the door: ‘Gyno. Tomorrow. 9:30.’
“So we’ll go and sit down, and the doctor will come and talk and the doctor’s maintaining a high level of professionalism. He’s like, ‘Well, you know sir, I have to, in order to share information’—I’m like, ‘Deyjah, they want you to sign this…so we can share information. Is there anything you would not want me to know?’ ‘See doc? No problem.’
“So then they say, ‘I just want you to know there are other ways besides sex that the hymen can be broken. Like bike riding, athletics, horseback riding, and just other forms of athletic physical activity.’ So I said, ‘Look, doc, she don’t ride no horses, she don’t ride no bikes, she don’t play no sports. Just check the hymen, please. And give me back my results expeditiously.”
“As of [Deyjah’s] 18th birthday, her hymen is still intact.”
Needless to say, Twitter had some thoughts about this revelation.
https://twitter.com/race_jones/status/1192099572191027201
Policing girls and teen's sexuality messes them up when they reach adulthood. This situation is an extreme example of this. When your parent was the first to cross these boundaries, you're already being taught you don't have any sexual agency. This is harmful parenting.
— Natelegé Whaley 🌺 (@natelege_) November 6, 2019
OH GOD IT SOMEHOW GETS WORSE pic.twitter.com/3Utyy406yK
— Sophia Benoit (@1followernodad) November 6, 2019
https://twitter.com/LeslieMac/status/1192128159468130305
I have bad news for T.I.
After 6 months of vaginal sex…my hyman broke.
— Ellen Barkin (@EllenBarkin) November 6, 2019
And virginity is a social construct and not measured by a hymen.
— Dr. Logan Levkoff (@LoganLevkoff) November 6, 2019
holy fucking shit this is so scary and assault-y and possessive and awful. That doctor should be stripped of his license https://t.co/ASPWVLSmg4
— Sophia Benoit (@1followernodad) November 6, 2019
this just derailed my whole day because of how disgusting and enraging and humiliating and abusive it is
T.I. Said He Goes To The Gynecologist With His Daughter Every Year To "Check Her Hymen"https://t.co/aVIcId4hsV pic.twitter.com/pQMJsbFobC
— anna borges (@annabroges) November 6, 2019
https://twitter.com/JillFilipovic/status/1192126537186844672
def did not think we would be talking about hymens today. or TI
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) November 6, 2019