How did you figure she was "maligned" exactly? She was extremely well-respected and well-connected. She wrote the tracks for the Commodores that got them signed to Motown Records as well as wrote "Uptown for the Chambers Brothers. And this was in the 60's long before she ever met Miles. Barry Gordy even offered her a job as a songwriter for Motown. She put out her first album and had the Pointer Sisters singing backup and Sly and the Family Stone's rhythm section backing her. You don't get that type of backing band on your debut record without a lot of respect. I mean Muhammad Ali and Richard Pryor were fans and would turn up at her shows. Also I don't believe she ever saw herself as even part of the Rock and Roll world, she was straight up Funk.

Modern day search engines still aren't it seems, I tried looking her up yesterday and kept getting results for Bette Davis instead for her until I turned off all safe search features. And what I saw did not at all warrant filtering her out for sexual content IMO.

How so maligned? Because of her marriage to and influence on Miles Davis (similar to Yoko Ono and John Lennon)?

Agree she was under rated.

Probably the GP was just asking if she was maligned for similar reasons as Yoko. (The answer is no.)

I was simply asking a question- not insinuating anything.

Chaka Khan, Mavis Staples, Bernadette Cooper etc would disagree.

Betty predates Chaka and Bernadette (and Chaka admits to influence from Betty), and Mavis was considerably prudish compared to the stage antics of Betty.

Betty's gravity on Miles alone would be enough to guarantee her iconic status, but her overall body of work is significant for its overall influence.