T.I. Clarifies Comments About His Daughter’s Gynecologist Appointments
T.I. finally addressed his controversial comments about his daughter's hymen.
Earlier this month, the rapper received major backlash after revealing he makes “yearly trips to the gynecologist" in order to ensure his 18-year-old daughter, Deyjah, is still a virgin. Now, in a new interview on Red Table Talk, he broke his silence regarding the controversy to "clear up any misconceptions" about how he parents his children.
In fact, he told host Jada Pinkett Smith he was just joking. "I think all of this surrounds a conversation that I was having in a very joking manner, when asked how do I deal with parenting in this day and age," T.I. began. "And so I just began to, you know, from a place of truth, I began to embellish and exaggerate."
"And I think that a lot people kind of like took it extremely literal, because if you put any of my reputation about like who I am as a father, who I've been, I honestly thought people knew me better than that," he added.
The "Whatever You Like" hitmaker went on to say that at first he couldn't grasp why people, including Chrissy Teigen and Iggy Azalea, were so upset about his comments. However, he "absolutely understands" now.
"My intentions, I think, have been terribly misconstrued and misconceived," T.I. explained. "Let me go set this record straight, I never said I was in any exam room, that is an assumption, that is a falsity. I never said that it was being done present day as an 18-year-old...and I never said that her mother wasn't present."
Elsewhere in his interview, T.I. also said he's incredibly sorry for putting his daughter through all of this public humiliation and revealed why he didn't acknowledge the situation sooner.
“My daughter said just let it go, don’t say nothing, just let it go and I did — until l I had different directives,” he. said. “I would not be here today had I not had those different directives. I’d still be sitting in silence.”
“She did have a problem with me talking about it however, and I understand that, and I am incredibly apologetic to her for that,” T.I. continued. “She understands my intentions and she knows who I am, who I’ve always been.”
You can watch T.I.'s full Red Table Talk interview, below: