Hip Hop Icons Weigh In On Olympics Breakdancing Competitor Rachael Gunn
Breakdancing was introduced this year at the Paris Olympics, but it may be the first and the last time that we’ll see it in the lineup.
According to WCNC Charlotte, breaking is not in the lineup of sports for the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028. Zack Slusser, Vice President of Breaking for Gold USA and USA Dance, shared that it all comes down to funding.
“The amount of exposure to the right people that can bring real change to our community, to our platform to help it grow — it’ll be significant to us,” he said in a statement.
“It’ll allow us, for the first time, to find sustainability and help us elevate our platform. It would be great to see breaking make it back to the Olympic Games again. But at the same time, it’s really going to go back to community work and leveraging this opportunity internally.”
Comments on this year’s breaking competition were mostly negative, with participant Rachael Gunn becoming a meme and going viral for the wrong reasons. Legendary B-Boy Crazy Legs shared his reaction to Gunn participating in the Olympics for the category in an Instagram video.
“My personal opinion is that she should’ve never been on that stage,” he shared.
He continued his sentiments, sharing how she should’ve admitted that the competition was “out of her league” and to “fall back” as she wasn’t ready to compete. He addressed the backlash she’s received and encouraged people to “ease up” on her.
“Do I think she deserves the amount of criticism that she’s getting? Nah. Homegirl’s been dragged globally, dragged hardcore. People should ease up because the focus at this point should be all the good that came out of it.”
Hip Hop icons Dr. Dre and Jermaine Dupri weighed in on the topic, with Dre telling Entertainment Tonight he “did not like that.”
“It’s so many great breakdancers that I don’t know why they had this particular person doing that,” he told the outlet.
Dupri shared similar sentiments in a separate video and stated why nobody should “take it easy” on her.
“Taking it easy on the young lady to me doesn’t train her and give her the true essence of what hip-hop is about,” he expressed. “Hip-Hop is about battling and if you lose, you come back. You go home, practice and come back. That’s the essence of hip-hop. That’s an element of hip-hop and for some reason, I don’t know who it is and how why, but some people are trying to take that element out of this s###. Man, Hip-Hop is not meant to be soft.”