DaBaby Apologizes, Admits He Was Wrong After Meeting With HIV Groups

DaBaby is finally admitting he's wrong.

After his disastrous rant about both LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV during July's Rolling Loud music festival in Miami, the rapper is scrambling to make things right. Now it looks like he's going in the right direction by listening to leading HIV advocacy groups.

Back at the beginning of August, eleven HIV organizations, including Arianna's Center, the Black AIDS Institute, GLAAD, The Normal Anomaly Initiative, Prevention Access Campaign, Relationship Unleashed, and leaders from the Gilead COMPASS Initiative including Southern AIDS Coalition, Emory University, the University of Houston, and Wake Forest University, wrote an open letter to the rapper, asking to meet with him to discuss the facts about the disease.

Now, he's met with those organizations, and he's ready to admit he was uninformed about the issues.

"During our meeting, DaBaby was genuinely engaged, apologized for the inaccurate and hurtful comments he made about people living with HIV, and received our personal stories and the truth about HIV and its impact on Black and LGBTQ communities with deep respect," the leaders and organizations said in a joint statement. "We appreciate that he openly and eagerly participated in this forum of Black people living with HIV, which provided him an opportunity to learn and to receive accurate information."

The statement also says DaBaby admitted his original comments were ignorant. "DaBaby acknowledged that the HIV facts we presented -- many of which he himself was unaware of -- are what every American needs to know: HIV is preventable and when treated properly, cannot be passed on," it said.

"DaBaby's willingness to listen, learn, and grow can open the door to an entirely new generation of people to do the same..." Marina Miller, Community Outreach Coordinator with the Southern AIDS Coalition said. "Ending HIV stigma requires doing the hard work of changing hearts and minds, and often that begins with something as simple as starting a dialogue. We hope DaBaby will use his platform to educate his fans and help end the epidemic."

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