TikTok is being accused of ostracizing Black creators while recently hosting a virtual meet and greet with Nicki Minaj.  According to NBC News, Black attendees said they were not given enough opportunities to speak up when the app kicked off Black History Month with an "exclusive virtual TikTok creator Meet Up" on Feb. 8.

The organizers, according to an email obtained by NBC News, sent invitations to creators, saying attendees would have a chance to "brainstorm content ideas" with Minaj and preview her new music. After attending the meeting, Black creators said it was non-Black participants who were mostly given a chance to ask questions. 

Anthony Hyland, a 29-year-old poet and public speaker, said TikTok's  “exclusive” celebration of Black History Month was misleading. 

"Not that they couldn't invite other communities," Hyland told NBC News. "But the majority of the creators there should have represented the demographic of the event that [they] were holding, and that was not true."

The social media platform issued an apology in a statement.

"This month, we invited creators across our diverse TikTok creator community to attend a virtual Black History Month event with Nicki Minaj in celebration of her new music," a spokesperson said. "We fell short of providing the experience we intended and we are profoundly sorry for the negative impact caused by our missteps. #BlackTikTok, we hear you, we value you and we will do better."

According to BuzzFeed, TikTok said some participants struggled to access the meeting due to technical issues. Black creators also said they didn't receive a link to the meeting until 10 minutes after it began. 

"If I had to give a percentage, I would say between 75 to 85% of creators on that Zoom were not Black," Hyland said. "And of the six questions that were available to be asked to her [Minaj] only two came from Black creators."

The TikTok spokesperson said more than 60 percent of the selected questions were from Black creators, but Minaj went off-script during the meeting and began responding to attendees whose questions weren't on the preselected list.