Kanye West will not back down.
The rapper, 45, joined Tucker Carlson for an interview on Fox News on Thursday night and defended the controversial ‘White Lives Matter’ t-shirts he shown on his Yeezy Season 9 track during Paris fashion week Monday.
“They’re looking for an explanation – as an artist you don’t have to give an explanation, but as a leader you do,” West, who legally changed his name to Ye in 2021, said.
“So the answer to why I wrote ‘White Lives Matter’ on a shirt is: They do. It’s obvious. »
The phrase “White Lives Matter” has been classified as a “white supremacist phrase” by the Anti-Defamation League, and several fashion insiders in attendance walked out of Ye’s show upon seeing the shirts, including Jaden Smith.
After Vogue editor and stylist Gabriella-Karefa Johnson called the designs “deeply offensive, violent and dangerous”, West publicly ridiculed his personal styleprompting more in the industry – among them Gigi Hadid and Hailey Baldwin – to come to his defense and criticize West.
However, sources told Page Six Style that Ye is baffled by the negative reaction to his collection and thinks it’s a “PC thing”.
In his interview with Carlson, he blamed “a mob group” of “liberal Nazis” with the backlash he received.
“I do some things from a feeling,” West said. “I just channel the energy, it feels good. He uses an instinct, a connection to God and just shine.
Ye even said that his father, a former Black Panther, enjoyed tees.
“I thought the shirt was a funny shirt,” West said. “I thought the idea of wearing it was funny. And I said, ‘Dad, why do you think that’s funny?’ And he said, ‘Just a black man stating the obvious.’ “
And despite his coping with Adidas being in dangerWest makes no apologies and plans to continue wearing (and handing out) the shirts.
“Someone called me last night and said, ‘Anyone wearing a ‘White Lives Matter’ shirt is going to be lit green. It means they’re going to beat them if they wear it,” he told Carlson.
“I’m like, you know, ‘Okay, give me the green light, then.'”
