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Madison McCarthy

Holding him Responsible: Kanye "Ye" West

BY: MADISON MCCARTHY / SPORTS CO-EDITOR

Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has learned a vital lesson in the past few weeks: the more people listening, the more impactful your words truly are.


Ye has recently been dropped by Adidas after a sting of Antisemitic tweets. After the announcement, Forbes reported, Ye's net worth dropped so dramatically he is no longer a billionaire.


Immediately following the Oct. 9 tweet, Ye’s Twitter account was suspended. However, with the company being placed in the hands of Tesla founder Elon Musk, the account has been reinstated. While there is no official statement from Twitter or Musk, he replied to Ye’s first tweet back with, “Don’t kill what ye hate,Save what ye love.”


When given a large platform to the extent West has, you have an unwritten responsibility to treat others with respect. Given that West is highly influential in several different spaces like fashion and music, his words are read by millions of people. When your thoughts are broadcast to millions of impressionable people, suddenly, your words mean more.


Despite his hateful and dangerous rhetoric, Ye has appeared on virtually every talk show, news broadcast, and podcast that exists. Continuing to give hateful comments an outlet is a point of controversy in American society.

LIU Sophomore, Mikayla Behm; who is of Jewish ethnicity, explains, “In the state he’s in right now, people should stop enabling him. Especially these big media companies that just want to use his name to get a couple of clicks. It's very convenient for them, but I think they should definitely stop talking to him about this stuff.”


In the past, Ye has opened up about struggling with his mental health. He has been upfront about being diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. According to the CDC, “Bipolar disorder is a mood disorder that can cause intense mood swings. Along with the mood swings, bipolar disorder causes changes in behavior, energy levels, and activity levels.”


However, Behm mentions, “When you have Bipolar disorder, he may have let go of his inhibitions and may be saying things that he wouldn't have said before but it doesn't mean that these thoughts just randomly came up. Mostly likely he has had these thoughts and now he's saying them. They didn't come from nowhere.”


Ye also received extensive backlash after wearing a ‘white lives matter' tee shirt to his Yeezy Season Nine fashion show. The artist was joined by conserveitive political commentator, Candace Owens.


Following Ye’s Antisemtic tweet Owens’ told The Daily Wire the following:

Photo caption (Kanye West and Candace Owens wearing ‘White Lives Matter’ shirts at Yeezy Season Nine fashion show Oct. 3 (Photo: The New York Post)

"If you are an honest person, you did not think this tweet was antisemitic," adding "It's like you cannot even say the word 'Jewish' without people getting upset"


Given that Owens’ is not from a part of the Jewish community, she is not directly affected by Ye’s statements and therefore does not see a problem with them.


For people like myself, who are not suffering at the hands of hate, the best thing we can do is listen.


Mikayla explained, “Listen to Jewish people. Try listen to Jewish people who are really actively affected by Antisemitism everyday, especially the Hasidic community. Educate yourself on actual Jewish history and know what happened to them? and where did they come from? Just see the Jewsih people as a people and not just as a religion.”

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