Rihanna on Why Rachel Dolezal Was 'A Bit of a Hero' & Still Caring for Chris Brown
In the November 2015 issue of Vanity Fair, Rihanna says that she will always “care” about Chris Brown. (photo: Getty)
Rihanna opened up about her personal life in a new interview with Vanity Fair for their November cover, her third magazine cover in the past two months. The star spoke candidly about her past relationships, including most famously Chris Brown, as well as her thoughts on Rachel Dolezal, celebrity, and more.
“I will care about him until the day I die,” she said of Brown. “We’re not friends, but it’s not like we’re enemies. We don’t have much of a relationship now.”
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On their long relationship (which Rihanna says was her last relationship), she said, “I was that girl. That girl who felt that as much pain as this relationship is, maybe some people are built stronger than others. Maybe I’m one of those people built to handle shit like this.”
Rihanna covers the November 2015 issue of Vanity Fair.
She added that she thought she could change him, and that their relationship helps her relate to people who’ve been in similarly abusive situations. Still, she resents being held up as a poster child for domestic violence victims. “I just never understood that, like how the victim gets punished over and over,” she told the magazine. “It’s in the past, and I don’t want to say ‘Get over it,’ because it’s a very serious thing that is still relevant; it’s still real. A lot of women, a lot of young girls, are still going through it. A lot of young boys too. It’s not a subject to sweep under the rug, so I can’t just dismiss it like it wasn’t anything, or I don’t take it seriously. But, for me, and anyone who’s been a victim of domestic abuse, nobody wants to even remember it.”
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As far as her current relationship status, she’s single – but that doesn’t mean the star is interested in participating in hook-up culture. “If I wanted to I would completely do that,“ Rihanna told the magazine. "I am going to do what makes me feel happy, what I feel like doing. But that would be empty for me; that to me is a hollow move. I would wake up the next day feeling like shit. When you love somebody, that’s different. Even if you don’t love them per se, when you care enough about somebody and you know that they care about you, then you know they don’t disrespect you. And it’s about my own respect for myself. A hundred percent.”
Rihanna didn’t tackle too many political questions in her interview, but she did address one of this summer’s most notorious figures: Rachel Dolezal, who insisted she was "transracial.” “I think she was a bit of a hero, because she kind of flipped on society a little bit,“ said Rihanna. "Is it such a horrible thing that she pretended to be black? Black is a great thing, and I think she legit changed people’s perspective a bit and woke people up.”
Read the full interview at Vanity Fair.
