Fact-Checking the Nba Youngboy Sexuality Rumors: What the Evidence Actually Shows
The origins of the speculation trace back to late 2021. Confined to his home in Salt Lake City, Utah, under strict federal pretrial release conditions, YoungBoy released the music video for "Black Ball." In several sequences, viewers noticed him wearing dark eyeliner and black lipstick. Almost instantly, internet forums and gossip pages ran wild with unsourced claims.
During a rare, candid Clubhouse session hosted by DJ Akademiks in December 2021, Gaulden addressed the aesthetic choice without hesitation. He explained that wearing makeup provided a creative outlet that made him feel comfortable and detached from his usual persona. "I like painting my face, putting makeup on," he said, noting that his engineer went out to buy the cosmetics for him. "It make me feel like, I don't know, I feel comfortable."
Rather than retreating after early blowback, he doubled down by displaying brightly painted fingernails in promotional photographs and videos throughout 2022 and 2023. For an audience conditioned on rigid Southern rap tropes, this cosmetic pivot proved disorienting. Bad-faith commentators deliberately conflated alternative fashion with sexual orientation, sparking a cycle of celebrity rumor debunking that persists across social platforms.