Iggy Azalea Targeted By Petitioners Who Want Billboard Award Retracted

Iggy Azalea can't escape her problems. The Australian rapper, 24, is facing heat from music fans who are unhappy with her recent win at the 2015 Billboard Music Awards.

The "Black Widow" performer took home the honors of Top Streaming Artist, Top Rap Artist, and Top Rap Song for her collaboration "Fancy" with Charli XCX. Dissenters are taking issue with the last award, claiming Azalea, who was nominated twice in the category, was ineligible to win Top Rap Song over Big Sean, Nicki Minaj, and Bobby Shmurda.

A petition on the matter was created on Change.org and is quickly gaining steam, counting more than 17,500 supporters as of Wednesday morning. "Retract Iggy Azalea's Ineligible Award for 'Fancy,'" the petition to Billboard is titled.

"Iggy Azalea's 2015 Billboard Award for Best Song has been proven invalid," the call for change reads. "The eligibility time period for nominations is March 10th, 2014 through March 2015. 'Fancy' was released on February 17th, 2014, nearly a month before the eligibility starting."

"This is unfair to the other nominees in these category, especially to 'Anaconda' by Nicki Minaj, who most likely would've won," continues the message from those who are clearly much bigger Minaj fans. "Billboard did not follow their own guidelines and should have to recalculate these nominations without 'Fancy' as a nominee."

While the petitioners are correct about the song's release date, they are misinformed about its eligibility, according to those involved in the judging. A rep for the Billboard Music Awards' production company, Dick Clark Productions, told the International Business Times that the song "was eligible" and clarified the guidelines.

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The March-to-March period that Billboard monitors is not based on a song's release date, but rather its chart performance and sales data within those 12 months. Though it made its debut a month before the "reporting period" began, "Fancy" still saw the great success in that time.

Azalea, who decided to hand her social media accounts over to her team after facing widespread hatred and vitriol, has stayed mum on the controversy. Minaj has avoided the topic as well, but tweeted earlier this week, "Why are ppl on social media always so mad? Life is good, yall. Get out there & experience it."

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