Grime MC Stormzy has apologised for using homophobic language on Twitter, after the Pink News site uncovered tweets stretching across three years that used words including “faggot”.

Amongst numerous other uses of the word, he called a gay character on EastEnders a “fucking fag”, asked a Twitter user who was discussing hair straighteners and curling tongs “are you a fag?”, and told his followers: “Put on bbc1 this little black boy is a fucking fag”. He also described various people and things as “proper gay”.

He has now posted a series of repentant tweets, saying: “I said some foul and offensive things whilst tweeting years ago at a time when I was young and proudly ignorant. Very hurtful and discriminative views that I’ve unlearned as I’ve grown up and become a man ... The comments I made were unacceptable and disgusting, full stop. Comments that I regret and to everyone I’ve offended, I am sorry, these are attitudes I’ve left in the past ... I take responsibility for my mistakes and hope you can understand that my younger self doesn’t reflect who I am today.”

After his rise in 2015 with the freestyle Shut Up, the MC has had a hugely successful 2017, scoring a number one album, winning a Mercury prize nomination and a GQ man of the year award.



His apology comes a week after YouTube star Zoella similarly had to apologise for tweets she had made some years ago, referring to people as “chav” and “tramp”, and writing: “I find it funny when gay men spit … it’s like they’re trying to be a bit macho but never works.”