Nicki Minaj Re-Appropriates Nazism, And It Looks Far Chicer

Nicki Minaj continues to cause outrage with the latest single, “Only,” from her forthcoming The Pinkprint album. Set against the backdrop of animated Nazi/fascist imagery, Minaj drives the point home with the lyrics to the song being scrolled over the screen (visualization of words is key for indoctrination, after all).

Lambasted by everyone from the Anti-Defamation League to BuzzFeed, Minaj has had the misfortune of discovering that, yes, it’s still “too soon” to appropriate Nazi symbolism into one’s work. Admittedly, there is no great meaning behind the video, other than to confirm that she’s the dictator in control of her crew, in this case, Drake, portrayed as a pope-like religious figure, Chris Brown, her loyal Nazi soldier, and Lil’ Wayne, more of a Goebbels-type advisor in a business suit. But honestly, is it really a crime to incorporate the visual accoutrements of fascism into a music video over sixty years after the fact? The answer is apparently a resounding yes as, unfortunately for Minaj, the head of the Anti-Defamation League is a Holocaust survivor.

Amid the outcry and the demand for an apology, it’s likely that Minaj is sitting in her overly decadent Hitler chair with a knowing smile, aware that controversy always equals album sales. Somehow, one can’t help but think that Leni Riefenstahl would be proud of the mesmeric propaganda-like video Minaj has put forth. And, at the very least, Minaj has being a black woman on her side as well, because there would be far more enragement if a white male, like say, Eminem, had pulled a similar stunt.