DaBaby is once again stirring up controversy, and this time it’s not about a lyric, a club appearance, or an industry beef. The Charlotte rapper dropped a new music video Tuesday (September 16) for his track “Save Me”, and it’s got people online questioning whether he’s crossed the line between creativity and insensitivity.

The video reimagines a recent tragedy on Charlotte’s light rail system — the fatal stabbing of 23-year-old Ukrainian immigrant Iryna Zarutska. Security footage from the real-life incident showed Zarutska sitting alone on the train before being attacked without warning. In DaBaby’s retelling, he inserts himself into the story as a bystander who steps in, grabbing the attacker’s hand before the knife makes contact. From there, his on-screen character calmly escorts the would-be killer off the train and past the police waiting on the platform.

On paper, it might sound like a message about community responsibility, but many viewers saw something else entirely: exploitation of a young woman’s death for shock value. By Wednesday afternoon, the video had already racked up more than 400,000 views on YouTube, but not without a wave of backlash.

One TikToker with more than 60,000 followers, 404Breezy, put it plainly: “What in the world made him think it was OK to post that?” he said, also questioning who on DaBaby’s team thought the concept should ever see the light of day. “He made a mockery of her death. This n**ga was acting like he was Jesus or something in the music video, playing out the same scene, same scenario, like he’s God or something, and he can stop it, and he stops the whole thing and he rapping about it and sh*t.”

DaBaby has not responded to the backlash.