Posted by Kanye West has explained why he wore his “White Lives Matter” shirt during a new interview with Fox News.
Ye addressed his controversial Paris Fashion Week stunt in a conversation with Tucker Carlson on Thursday (October 6), revealing he thought the shirt was “funny.”
“I do certain things from a feeling,” he said. “I just channel the energy, it just feels right. It’s using a gut instinct, a connection with God, and just brilliance … God is preparing us for the real battles, and we are in a battle with the media. The majority of the media has a God-less agenda, and the jokes are not working. This whole like, ‘Oh, Ye’s crazy,’ and all these things, they don’t work.”
Kanye continued: “My dad is an educated ex-Black Panther and he put a text to me that said, ‘White Lives Matter hahaha.’ And I said, ‘I thought the shirt was a funny shirt.’ I said the idea of me wearing it was funny. I said, ‘Dad, what do you think of it?’ He said, ‘Just a Black man stating the obvious.’
“My favorite response, ’cause I kept on thinking, ‘They’re looking for an explanation.’ And people say, ‘Well, as an artist, you don’t have to give an explanation, but as a leader, you do.’ So the answer to why I wrote ‘White Lives Matter’ on a shirt is, because they do. It’s the obvious thing.”
Speaking on why the “White Lives Matter” slogan would be considered controversial, he said: “Because the same people that have stripped us of our identity and labeled us as a color have told us what it means to be Black, and the vernacular that we’re supposed to have.”
Kanye West also addressed his “White Lives Matter” shirt during a recent appearance on French television show Clique, explaining it was in response to seeing white people wear Black Lives Matter shirts.
“At a certain point, it felt like I saw white people wearing shirts that said ‘Black Lives Matter’ like they were doing me such a favor by having a T-shirt that reminded me that my life mattered, like I didn’t already know that,” he said. “So I thought I’d return the favor and let white people know that, ‘Hey, your life matters too.’”
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Ye also briefly elaborated on his previous comments about the Black Lives Matter movement being a “scam.”
“Well, because it’s proven,” he said. “They had people who ended up taking money from it. I mean, this documentation is out there. And just, as Black people, we’re gonna need more than just a T-shirt and a six million dollar home. We need what was promised to us.”