“Bye Felicia” is trending — and it’s not for reasons you may think.
TechCrunch is reporting that as of Oct. 28, Elon Musk — dude-bro savior, apartheid legacy kid, and all-around strange egg — officially owns Twitter.
Musk’s acquisition comes after months of speculation and legal drama that concluded with an exchange of $44 billion between the Tesla founder and the popular social media platform.
And in true Musk fashion, he made the announcement in the most cringe way.
As can be expected, the usual suspects — namely, those who support Donald Trump and all his mind-scratchingly ridiculous and racist shenanigans — began begging Musk to restore the former host of The Apprentice back to Twitter.
And when word got out that Musk began “cleaning house” — firing most of Twitter’s executives en masse upon his official takeover — the Ford F-150 crowd got “Bye Felicia” trending.
Because, naturally, “cleaning corporate house” — a common move in mergers and acquisitions — automatically means that Twitter can now become a white sheet-wearing utopia, where white people are free to say the n-word with a hard -er without fear of a digital — or literal — a** whooping.
That said, this is Apartheid Clyde we’re talking about here, so anything’s possible.
Nevertheless, for the benefit of the white people who have just discovered “Bye Felicia,” let’s take a look at the true origins of the phrase.
Bye Felicia: The Origins
In 1995, the film Friday was released — and the phrase “Bye Felicia” entered the pop culture lexicon.
According to People, the original spelling of Felicia’s name was “Felisha.” And per the outlet, Ice Cube — who co-wrote the film — claimed that the phrase was meant to be dismissive, to the point that it could be used in any context to get an annoying person out of your face…whether said person was named “Felicia” or not.
Other Uses
Prior to Ford F-150 Twitter getting a hold of the phrase, it was frequently used throughout various times in pop culture.
In 2009, RuPaul used “Bye Felicia” during an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race.
In 2014, VH1 released a reality show called Bye Felicia, and Jordin Sparks released a mixtape with the same name that same year.
Just one year later, Ice Cube’s son O’Shea Jackson Jr. used the phrase in Straight Outta Compton — in which he portrayed his father — as he was throwing a groupie out of the room.
In 2018, Michelle Obama used the phrase on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon to describe her experience of leaving the White House.
But the funniest usage of “Bye Felicia” outside of the context of the Friday films was in 2017, when Omarosa departed the Trump White House — and Good Morning America‘s Robin Roberts had a lot to say about it.
The Real Felicia — Angela Means — Speaks Up
While “Bye, Felicia” has certainly been a common staple of the AAVE lexicon since the 1990s, Angela Means — the actress who played Felicia in the Friday films — has mixed feelings on the subject.
As our sister site, Shadow & Act, reported, Means took her character seriously — to the point that she, as a person, disappeared, and “Felicia” emerged as a stand-alone character.
Means also said that Felicia was a symbol of how society failed Black women and girls in the 1990s, and felt that her most infamous character “fell through the cracks,” in a manner of speaking.
“Maybe people were tired of her….Why was there so much hate for such an obviously beautiful woman? She’s kind, you didn’t hear her using any profanity…Why would they be so unkind to a family member?” she said. “Why would they be so dismissive? Why would no one defend her? And I’ve asked this question for 30 years,” she continued through tears. “Why is it so easy for us to dismiss each other like that?… When people come at me and even to this day, I’ll see people saying, ‘Bye, you dirty bitch, you f—ed up bitch, you dumb bitch.’ Not one time, not even the mother, said, ‘Hey, it’s Felicia. I wonder what’s going on with her.’ Not one person.”
