Gina Rodriguez Apologizes For Using Racial Slur In Instagram Story

After posting a video in which she says a racial slur while singing a Fugees song, Gina Rodriguez has shared an apology on her Instagram page ― though plenty of people are noting that she entirely missed the point.

On Tuesday, the actor posted a video on her Instagram Story of herself singing along to the song, “Ready or Not.” In the clip, she clearly says the lyrics, “voodoo / I can do what you do, easy, believe me / Fronting niggas give me hee-bee-gee-bees.”

The response to the video was swift, with people calling out Rodriguez on Twitter.

The 35-year-old has since deleted the video and posted an apology.

“I am sorry if I offended anyone by singing along to the Fugees, to a song I love that I grew up on. I love Lauryn Hill,” she says in two videos also posted on her Story. “I really am sorry if I offended you.”

Some remarked that the video seemed insincere, while others couldn’t help but note that the apology was conditional. As HuffPost’s Erin Evans said, “If your apology contains an if in it, then you ain’t sorry. don’t put a condition on your apology.”

Rodriguez posted a follow-up apology on her Instagram page later on Tuesday, adding that she “thoughtlessly sang along to the lyrics of a favorite song, and even worse, I posted it.”

“The word I sang, carries with it a legacy of hurt and pain that I cannot even imagine. Whatever consequences I face for my actions today, none will be more hurtful than the personal remorse I feel,” she wrote, before adding that she has “some serious learning and growing to do.”

This controversy comes on the heels of the “Jane the Virgin” star being called “anti-Black.” In addition to making contentious comments in November at a Net-a-Porter roundtable, where she said Black women are paid more than Latinx women, the actor was also criticized after tweeting about Marvel and DC Comic’s lack of Latinx people in their films in the wake of the success of “Black Panther.” Critics viewed her as detracting from the film’s success, and also saw her comments as a dig to the Black Latina women who have appeared in superhero movies.

Rodriguez later went on the radio show “Sway in the Morning” on to address her comments and called the backlash “devastating.”

“The Black community was the only community I looked to growing up. We didn’t have that many Latino shows, so the Black community made me feel like I was seen,” she said. “So to get anti-Black is saying that I’m anti-family.”