Kanye West recently gave a spur-of-the-moment interview and finally apologized for his George Floyd comments—but his apology was almost equally as problematic.
Source: Photo by Johnny Nunez/WireImage / Photo by Johnny Nunez/WireImage
Kanye West’s October has been a roller coaster. Just last week he lost his deal with Adidas marking the end of the Yeezy sneakers and he reportedly made a trip to Skechers to find a new home for them—but was promptly escorted out.
Kanye West Apologizes For George Floyd Comments, Compares Current Backlash To Having A Knee On His Neck
On Saturday Kanye decided to speak to the media while leaving his daughter’s basketball and he FINALLY apologized for claiming that George Floyd died from Fentanyl. He likened the backlash to “having a knee on his neck” and also spoke on the antisemitic comments that got him canned by Adidas.
According to Ye, God is “humbling him.”
“I had experiences where I felt like I was being teamed up on,” said West. “And I didn’t realize that term would be antisemitic. So I had a mediation with Adidas today and I think Adidas felt like cause everyone else was ganging up on me that they had the right to take my designs.”
“I feel like this is God humbling me right now,” he continued. “Cause there are two things that are happening. A lot of times when I would say ‘I am the richest Black man,’ it would be a defense that I would use for the mental health conversation.”
“What’s happening right now is I’m being humbled. Another thing that’s happening to me is by being burned to the flesh every single day, it’s actually proving what I had to say. When I went to the mediation, what I wanna say is, Black people are like okay, ‘Lex Friedman got you to apologize, Piers Morgan got you to apologize to Jews, but you never apologized to us about the George Floyd comment that made us feel bad.’”
“When the idea of Black Lives Matter came out, it made us come together as a people,” he says. “So when I said that and I questioned the death of George Floyd, it hurt my people. It hurt Black people. So, I want to apologize [unclear] because God has shown me by what Adidas is doing and by what the media is doing, I know how it feels to have a knee on my neck now. So thank you God for humbling me and letting me know how it really felt. Because how could the richest Black man ever be humbled other than to be made to not be a billionaire in front of everyone off one comment.”
It seems Kanye and Adidas have a long way to go in their separation but Ye seems to be taking all of this including the loss of billionaire status as a wake-up call. And while he might be apologizing, his comments are continuing to embolden antisemites.
Last night after the Georgia and Florida college football game a sign saying “Kanye was right about the Jews” was displayed as fans left the arena.
You can watch Ye’s full interview below.