“Seeing all these people unfollow makes me feel like I’ve defeated a large beast…I feel free”- Doja Cat addresses fans unfollowing her on Instagram

Grammy-winning rapper Doja Cat is in the news again for taking to Instagram and giving her two cents about losing a large following on her social media accounts. Doja faced criticism for being ungrateful to her fans, but she was not having any of it. After an earlier Twitter post that made her lose nearly 180,000 Instagram followers, the 27-year-old singer has unzipped her feelings about it. The rapper finally took to Instagram, sharing a story on August 16, and wrote:

“Seeing all these people unfollow me makes me feel like I've defeated a large beast that's been holding me down for so long and it feels like I can reconnect with the people who really matter and love me for who I am and not for who I was. I feel free.”

Doja Cat's story on August 16 (Image via Instagram/ @dojacat)

Doja’s story about her fans’ unfollowing comes a month after she Tweeted that her fans “don’t get to name themselves s**t” and if they go down the road of calling themselves “kitten” or “kittenz”, then they really need to get a hard look at themselves.

A fan responded to Doja’s tweet, asking for an alternative name for her fanbase, but she had a grave comeback to that tweet as well.

Doja Cat tweeted in response to her fan (Image via Twitter/ @nekotishka)

According to ET, the entire episode led to many fans deleting their social media accounts, including some of her well-known fan pages like The Kittens Room, Doja HQ, and Doja Cat News.

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Doja Cat believes she “deserves love and respect” from those she “loves and respects back”

Doja Cat’s Instagram story came on the same day as the news of her selection as one of the three cover stars for Harper's BAZAAR's September 2023 ICONS issue. In her interview for the magazine, she bared her perspective on being loved and respected.

"I think I deserve love and respect from the people that I love and respect back -- and I guess respect means different things to some people, I put myself out there on social media and TV. I shoot my image out onto these screens. But I don't really put myself out there in real life. I don't go to clubs. I stick to creating."

Doja Cat on stage (Image via Doja Cat/C3)

The Streets singer further said,

“When people become engaged with someone they don't even know on the internet, they kind of take ownership over that person. They think that person belongs to them in some sense, and when that person changes drastically, there is a shock response that is almost uncontrollable. … I've accepted that that’s what happens. So I put my wigs on and take them off. I shave my head or my eyebrows. I have all the freedom in the world."

Doja seems to be unapologetically setting rules for her life without surrendering herself to her fans or showering them with blind love. Such a sense of disconnection from fans is not new among artists. Singer Miley Cyrus shared similar feelings of “disconnect” with her fans because singing for hundreds of thousands of people felt unnatural and isolating. Read what the Flowers singer said here.