All About Laughs
Timbaland and Swizz Beatz have made a lot of money off their VERZUZ series. The popular show sees acts from across various generations of hip-hop and R&B “face-off” in a celebration of their respective catalogs and eras. Despite how great it is to see some of our favorites get their shine, some have pointed out that VERZUZ has lent its platform to acts with less than flattering backgrounds including accused abusers like Soulja Boy and Tiny Harris.
Tiny and her husband T.I are currently embroiled in a legal battle with a handful of people who have accused them of misconduct over the years. This stems from claims initially made by family friend Sabrina Peterson, who told her social media followers that she was held at gunpoint by T.I and that he and Tiny have a history of mistreating women. This has resulted in their reality show T.I & Tiny: Family & Friends Hustle being temporarily suspended and T.I losing out on his role in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.
Soulja Boy and socialite Nia Riley were one of the many couples thrusted into the spotlight thanks to their affiliation with the hit VH1 Reality Show Love & Hip-Hop. The pair shared a tumultuous love story, one that eventually spilled over into Marriage Bootcamp and media headlines. Nia is Teddy Riley’s daughter, another VERZUZ alumni. Back in March Nia did an interview with Tasha K where she confessed that Soulja kicked her in the stomach causing a miscarriage.
Tasha asked “Soulja boy kicked you in the stomach?” before asking “Did you tell him that you were pregnant?”
Nia responded, “We had an incident when I was pregnant. He absolutely knew. I was, like, fifteen weeks. I don’t think I had even told anybody else that I was pregnant. Truthfully, in my mind, I didn’t know what to do or what I wanted to do.” She says shortly afterwards later that night she’d realized that she had a miscarriage.
The Undefeated did a piece ahead of Soulja Boy’s VERZUZ against Bow Wow where they questioned why the platform keeps giving the spotlight to people with such controversial pasts. They pointed out both Tiny and Soulja’s pasts as well as the inclusion of Russell Simmons who has been accused of misconduct by over 20 women. They pointed out “It’s time to hold [Timbaland and Swizz Beatz] Verzuz to the standard of something that has proclaimed to love us back. That means standing with survivors and telling some people ‘no.’ There’s still time for Verzuz to turn a corner and be more conscientious about who it endorses and promotes.”
