WITH her chart-topping hits, growing collection of awards, and access to top designers, Doja Cat seems to have it pretty good - but it's not always such smooth sailing for the Grammy winner.
Doja has battled accusations of Satanism, backlash for her controversial relationships, and even more public scrutiny.
Doja, who is headlining Coachella next month, recently teased that a sequel to her album Scarlet is in the works, with an Instagram post showing song titles with “S2” perhaps short for Scarlet 2 as the header.
Scarlet debuted at No. 4 on the US Billboard 200 when it was released in October 2023, so it’s unsurprising that the artist would be eager to capitalize on its success.
She will continue her Scarlet tour, which began in North America late last year, with shows scheduled in the UK and Europe.
But excitement for Doja’s live shows and new music comes amid her decision to deactivate her Instagram account, which had almost 25 million followers.
According to , the Paint The Town Red rapper said she was having “f**ked up thoughts” as a result of how she was being “treated” on the app.
“Hey I'm gonna deactivate because I'm not really feeling this anymore,” she wrote in a now-deleted post.
“You guys take care of yourselves.
“I like coming here to find inspo and see people being creative but I just feel like this is getting to be too much.”
Doja’s parasocial relationship with her fans previously led to her losing over 250,000 followers.
She was unimpressed when her most loyal patrons gave themselves a nickname to show their allegiance.
“My fans don’t name themselves s**t,” she wrote on Instagram Threads.
“If you call yourself a ‘kitten’ or f**king ‘kittenz’ that means you need to get off your phone and get a job and help your parents with the house.”
Doja, whose legal name is Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini, has a $12 million net worth.
However, she has often been critiqued for her dating choices, weight loss, tattoos, and even her choice of lyrics.
Here we reveal all…
Doja fans have speculated that she’s separated from her controversial boyfriend Jeffrey J. Cyrus.
X (formerly known as Twitter) users have claimed they saw her profile on Raya, an invite-only dating app.
J. Cyrus and the rapper were first seen together in November 2022, but it wasn’t until they were spotted sharing dinner in May 2023 that they were linked.
Fans blasted her dating choice as the streamer has a problematic past that includes both racism and sexual assault allegations.
Doja wasn’t afraid to defend her decision by blocking those speaking negatively about her and penning a heated tweet in all capital letters.
“I WANT YALL TO READ THIS COMMENT AND TAKE IT AS A MESSAGE,” she wrote.
“I DON'T GIVE A F**K WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT MY PERSONAL LIFE I NEVER HAVE AND NEVER WILL GIVE A F**K WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT ME OR MY PERSONAL LIFE GOODBYE AND GOOD RIDDANCE MISERABLE H**S HAHA!”
She was also accused of racism last fall when she uploaded a selfie wearing a T-shirt picturing Sam Hyde.
According to , Hyde is a right-wing comedian who was a co-writer on Adult Swim’s Million Dollar Extreme Presents: World Peace before it was canceled due to complaints that it featured racism and sexism.
He has publicly backed neo-Nazi causes and even donated money to the founder of the neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer, per the outlet.
Imagine being a pick me for incels… like Doja Cat is really trying her best to be canceled and un-famous again.
Doja Cat fan
Doja deleted her T-shirt selfie before posting another photo with Hyde cropped out and eye roll emojis in the caption.
A fan’s tweet went viral after they commented on a repost of the original selfie.
“Imagine being a pick me for incels… like Doja Cat is really trying her best to be canceled and un-famous again just so she can get back to those racial chat rooms full time,” they wrote.
The tweet referred to Doja’s public apology following a resurfaced video of her making sexual comments in an online chat room, which was full of people in the alt-right/incel community.
"I want to address what's been happening on Twitter," she said back in 2020, according to .
"I've used public chat rooms to socialize since I was a child.
“I shouldn't have been on some of those chat room sites, but I personally have never been involved in any racist conversations.
“I'm sorry to everyone that I offended."
“I'm a black woman. Half of my family is black from South Africa and I'm very proud of where I come from,” she added.
The rapper also had to explain the title of a resurfaced song called “Dindu Nuffin," a term used to mock Black victims of police brutality.
“I’m very sorry to anybody who’s taken offense, to anybody who I’ve hurt using this term,” she said in 2020, according to .
“When I used it, it was because I was in chat rooms all the time, and I was kind of locked away.
The song, however, I agree, may be the worst song in the entire world.
Doja Cat
“I was always on there just dealing with people coming at me left and right talking about different slanderous terms after another.
“The term that I used in the song is one that I learned that day.
"People were calling me it left and right, left and right and I used it in a song.
“It was to kind of take back and f**king just say ‘f**k you' to those people.’
"The song, however, I agree, may be the worst song in the entire world.”
The rapper has clapped back on many occasions after spotting fans commenting on her changing appearance.
In 2020, she showed herself scrolling through comments underneath YouTube’s #WCE (Woman Crush Everyday) playlist.
Several fans said her skin appeared to have been lightened and begged Doja to stop herself from being “whitewashed.”
“Hey, so if you’re stupid as f**k you probably left a comment under this picture talking about this,” Doja said.
“Hey, how about I’m half white, not entirely black, my skin gets very light when I don’t tan.
"I was staying indoors a lot before that shoot. New f**king subject, dumba**es.”
She took to Instagram again in 2022, after fans commented on her 20-pound weight loss.
I make hit after hit after hit and you all want me to look f**kable
Doja Cat
Doja wrote up a response to the criticism and got Apple's voice assistant Siri to read it aloud during a livestream.
“Do I have something to say,” Doja got Siri to recite, according to .
“A lot of you b***hes keep bringing up how I'm skinny and s**t and won't shut the f**k up because you think it's your place to speak when it's literally my f**king choice to eat more healthy and work out.
“I'm really f**king sick and tired of y'all talking about my body.”
"I used to be thicc and that's forever going to be your problem. Your problem. Not mine,” she added.
Doja divided fans later that year when she decided to shave her head and eyebrows because she had “never liked having hair.”
“I won a Grammy and traveled the f**king globe I've had a #1 and I went platinum,” she tweeted.
“I make hit after hit after hit and you all want me to look f**kable for you so you can go home and jerk your c**ks all day long while you live in your mother's basement.
"Go f**k yourselves."
Doja reignited Satanic panic when she unveiled a large tattoo of a bat skeleton across her back.
Many people took to social media concerned that the “demonic” inking indicated the message she would be putting out on her fourth album.
Their fears were confirmed when the rapper released the music video for Paint The Town Red, a song in which she refers to herself as the “devil” and a “demon lord.”
“Doja Cat's new song is literally just devil worship,” one person tweeted.
“I'm not kidding. May God protect our children.”
“What is Doja Cat’s obsession with the devil?" another wrote.
"Get this demonic heifer off my timeline. In Jesus name!”
Doja told that she painted the green creature with horns she dances on in the Paint The Town music video.
“It isn’t offensive. It’s just a green goblin-y monster guy,” she said.
“That was a really big piece for me.
“It was one of my proudest moments ever, and people wrote that off as Satanism, and it’s literally just a little green guy with horns and I’m standing on his head! Where’s the harm?”
Doja, who previously wore devil horns in her music video for the song Bottom B***h, sparked further outrage when she transformed into the devil for her Demons music video.
Some fans took to Twitter saying they “miss the old Doja Cat" and said they would no longer be listening to her music.
Doja sparked a debate among her fans when she fell out with Noah Schnapp, best known for appearing on Netflix’s Stranger Things.
Noah shared his exchange with the rapper on TikTok after she privately contacted him asking to be set up with his co-star Joseph Quinn, who plays Eddie Munson.
Doja clapped back on Instagram, which made her lose over 200,000 followers on the platform, according to the
“The fact that Noah did that, like went and posted a private conversation between me and him is so unbelievably like socially unaware and whack,” she said on Instagram Live.
“That’s like borderline snake s**t. That’s like weasel s**t.”
“I’m not saying that encapsulates his entire personality,” she added.
“I wouldn’t imagine he is. Maybe he is, like a whole snake.
“But I didn’t see him that way.
"I made an assumption that he was gonna be chill about it and he went and shared information that I didn’t feel comfortable with him sharing.”
Noah shared his response to the drama, in 2022, in a video uploaded to TikTok.
“Guys everything is all good, I apologized and I still follow her and love her music, no hard feelings,” he said.
