In the world of boy bands and girl groups, there inevitably comes a time when one member
ventures out on their own.
Usually, the aspiring solo artist either departs the group with a whole lot of class or a whole
lot of sass.
Camila Cabello's exit from Fifth Harmony seems to fall into the latter category.
From hinting that she had no intentions of harmonizing with her group for the rest of
her career to using the reputations of others to get ahead, here are the shadiest things
Camila Cabello has done that everyone just seems to ignore.
In it to win it
Fifth Harmony was formed by Simon Cowell during X Factor Season 2, in 2012.
Members Normani Kordei, Lauren Jauregui, Dinah-Jane Hansen, Ally Brooke, and Cabello were thrown
together after failing to impress the judges individually.
Fast forward to a 2015 interview with Latina Magazine, when Cabello was asked if she thought
the group's members would go their separate ways: she said yes, adding,
"The cool part is that we allow one another to do our own thing within this thing.
I think it's healthy because if not, personally, I would go insane."
But in retrospect, it doesn't seem like her bandmates shared her sentiments.
While still a member of Fifth Harmony, Cabello released two singles with artists outside
of the group: 2015's "I Know What You Did Last Summer" and 2016's "Bad Things."
It initially seemed like Cabello was trying to have her cake and eat it too, but by December
2016, she cut ties with the group that made her famous.
"Ratchet and sassy"
Prior to landing a spot in Fifth Harmony, Cabello was just another One Direction fangirl.
She told Beats 1's Zane Lowe:
"You don't understand, like, I had like a Twitter account for One Direction.
Like I was like one of those fangirls at one point."
Her handle was reportedly "ratchetandsassy" - an account which has since been taken over
by someone else.
But screenshots of Cabello's tweets from the summer of 2012 show her allegedly using the
n-word multiple times.
Cabello also retweeted some insensitive tweets about former One Direction member Zayn Malik
and his then-girlfriend, Perrie Edwards.
One tweet implied that Malik was Hispanic — He's English — and suggested that Edwards
was waiting for him at the Mexican border.
Although Cabello has never confirmed that she was the one behind the controversial account,
she did tweet "ratchetandsassy" in May 2013 writing, "I hate you lol."
Abusing her connections?
In 2014, Cabello had a brief fling with pop singer Austin Mahone.
The "Havana" songstress revealed that the two were dating on Watch What Happens Live
on November 3rd, 2014, but by November 24th of that year, the singer was telling KISS
96.1 that she and Mahone had split.
According to a Hollywood Life source, Cabello's initial reveal marked the beginning of the
end for the couple because Mahone wanted to keep the relationship private.
Mahone also supposedly accused Cabello of touting their romance in order to sell albums,
and she was allegedly so hurt by his accusations that they decided to split.
But this wouldn't be the last star that Cabello would try to hitch her wagon to.
Squad goals
"I will always be a Swifty."
For a minute, it seemed like everyone was trying to land a spot in Taylor Swift's girl
squad — including Cabello - even though she had already been hand-picked for a squad
of her own.
Cabello and Swift met at the 2014 MTV VMA's, and the rest is history.
Swift even threw Cabello an 18th birthday party at her house — with none of the rest
of Fifth Harmony anywhere to be found.
In April 2016, Victoria's Secret model Martha Hunt posted a video of Cabello teaching T-Swift's
squad the choreography from Fifth Harmony's song "Work From Home."
Meanwhile, her actual "Work From Home" squad was once again MIA.
Blindsiding her bandmates
According to Fifth Harmony's official statement in 2016, Cabello did not directly inform the
girls that she would be leaving the group and instead communicated the message through
her representatives.
However, according to Cabello's official statement, she claimed to be "shocked" about the statement
her former bandmates released about the break.
She wrote,
"The girls were aware of my feelings through the long, much needed conversations about
the future that we had during tour.
Saying that they were just informed through my representatives that I was 'leaving the
group' is simply not true."
But according to some sources, she may have 'officially' left the group a year earlier.
In October 2017, a "leaked" contract that supposedly detailed Cabello's departure surfaced,
making it appear as though Cabello had tried to leave the group in 2015.
The contract, which made its rounds on Twitter, revealed that Cabello stated,
"Be advised that I fully intend to remain in the group, but as an individual and not
as a member of the partnership."
While the authenticity of the contract was never confirmed, it certainly jives with what
Cabello did toward the end of her time with Fifth Harmony — behaving as a solo artist
while still technically being part of the group.
Faking it
In late 2017, Cabello opened up about her thoughts on fake friends, but the whole thing
felt like shots fired at her former group members.
She told Elle,
"You can think someone's your friend, and it could be out of convenience."
"And a year later...all of a sudden they have to stand up for you...And they don't have
your back."
It's probably no coincidence that she threw in the part about it being a "year later"
when she was a few months out from the one year anniversary of quitting Fifth Harmony.
Granted, her former bandmates seem to think she's a fake friend as well, seeing as they
did a VMA performance where they literally had a "fake Cabello" booted off of the stage.
Hopefully both parties can just agree to disagree on the terms of Cabello's exit and continue
to make music for their fans.
At the end of the day, that's really what it's all about.
Thanks for watching!
Click the Nicki Swift icon to subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Plus check out all this cool stuff we know you'll love, too!