While the internet is still smoking from the official rap beef between Megan Thee Stallion and Nicki Minaj reaching its pinnacle this past weekend, a new contender has entered the arena and has particular beef with Meg. Richard Kanka, the father of a seven-year-old girl who was molested and murdered by her neighbor and previously convicted child molester, Jesse Timmendequas. Subsequently, Megan’s Law, named for the victim, became a federal law which required sex offenders to register with local law enforcement. This is the same law which Megan Thee Stallion mentions in her newest release, “Hiss,” where she takes a not-so-subtle shot at Nicki Minaj, and her husband and/or brother, who are both convicted sex offenders. “These hoes don’t be mad at me, these hoes mad at Megan’s Law,” was the lyric that somewhat understandably caught the victim’s father off guard (Timmendequas’ victim’s father, not the fathers of Maraj’s and Petty’s victims).
However, Kanka’s threats of possibly pursuing legal action are not only without merit but seem somewhat hypocritical for a man who, according to his own social media, is a staunch defender or multiple amendments, including the first, whether he understands the difference between Facebook jail and real jail or not and victims’ rights.
Kanka’s justification for his anger is that the rap song was filled with expletives; I cannot imagine that a rap song that features curse words is anywhere nearly as heinous as the actual crime which she was originally associated with, but I digress.
they most likely have no legal options.
— auntie jawn. (she/ her) (@dopegirlfresh) January 30, 2024
megan's law being referenced in a rap song bothers richard kanka bc he's a conservative republican. that's the long and the short of it. https://t.co/1WshdD57gH
While having the memory of your slain daughter brought up in rap beef may be triggering, I wonder if Kanka’s response is more based on his far-right views than his disgust for the lyrics, as he claims. Kanka does not outright say he hates Black people on his Facebook page, but his timeline is filled with many far-right posts where he denies racism exists while also accusing the same factions he critiques of being racist. In 2022, Kenneth Petty, Minaj’s husband, failed to register as a sex offender when he moved into Minaj’s Calabasas mansion, which would be breaking Megan’s Law. I’m sure since he was not on the deed, he probably forgot to register his address, probably a minor oversight, minor.
Even though the Megan’s Law lyric was applied correctly, it did not stop Kanka’s ire.
With that said, his ire should not erase a reasonable expectation that the law would not be referenced in popular culture. For example, if it were mentioned on the television show Law & Order SVU, a scripted and fictional television show about sex crimes, which often grabs its show ideas from real-life events, I highly doubt he would have such an agitated and vocal response. I also wonder if his indignation ties into how consciously and subconsciously Black victims of sexual assault and child abduction are viewed and treated versus their white counterparts, especially when the mention correlates to real victimization and not scripted television. If the intent to name the law after her was partially for awareness, then this should be seen as somewhat of a success rather than a disrespectful jab at the law or the family, but Kanka himself wrote, “Obama says Americans are Racist against People breaking the Law [sic],” so maybe he thinks the rules are different for Black victims as well. Aside from Kanka’s response, the reality is that information about Petty’s crimes is no less important than information concerning White sexual offenders who commit the same crimes. Kanka’s visceral response is really indicative of a bigger problem involving Black victims of child abductions and sexually based crimes.
According to the National Crime Information Center, 37% of missing children under the age of 18 are Black. However, Black children only make up around 14% of the population. Black children are also vastly underrepresented when it comes to news reports of missing children and often erroneously labeled as runaways, which receive far less media or police attention. As originally reported by Biometrica, “[a] 2005 study by the Scripps Howard News Service noted that 162 missing children cases were reported by the Associated Press between Jan. 1, 2000, through December 31, 2004. The findings were that white children accounted for 67% of the Associated Press’ missing children coverage and 76% of CNN’s. Conversely, Black children accounted for only 17% of the AP’s coverage on missing children and 13% of CNN’s.”
Kanka does not allude to having done research on Petty’s crimes on his Facebook page, but I imagine he would not have been surprised to find out Petty’s victim was Black, simply due to the fact that intraracial crime is much higher than interracial crime. I am sure that if Petty had victimized a young white girl, Kanka’s support would lean as far right as he does. Ultimately, the law was created with the people having access to public information and increased awareness of sexual offenders living in their neighborhoods, what better way to make it known that Minaj’s husband and brother are sex offenders, especially since that’s literally the point of Megan’s Law.
Instead of Kanka being mad at a woman who shared a name with his daughter, who also was a victim of physical violence at the hands of a man and who is giving his daughter’s case renewed awareness, he instead decides to be just like Kenneth…petty.
