By now we’re used to Kanye West going full Kanye West at just about any moment, but a recent tweet landed the College Dropout emcee in a bit of controversy with some of his most loyal fans.
Last week, West sent out a brief casting notice for his upcoming fashion show, Yeezy Season 4. The only problem? According to Ye, he was only looking to cast multiracial women.
— KANYE WEST (@kanyewest) September 3, 2016
Regardless of his intent, the message many heard was loud and clear: Black women need not apply.
The condemnation across social media was swift, with many claiming the rapper had dissed Black women, who have supported West since he first burst on the scene. Hundreds of Black women even turned up at the casting call to protest the perceived slight.
In an interview with Vogue, West addressed the controversy, feigning ignorance about how exactly to put the call out for “all variations of Black.”
“The ten thousand people that showed up didn’t have a problem with it,” West said. “How do you word the idea that you want all variations of Black? How do you word that exactly?”
Let’s set aside the fact that Kanye actually went to college, was raised by a college English professor, and makes his living spinning words into slick and profound rhymes. But you mean to tell me he didn’t know how to say, “I’m looking for Black models” or “models of color wanted for my show”?
Nah, son.
If Ye’s past runway shows are our guide, he feels comfortable finding–and using–all shades of Black models, so why was the language so clunky this time around?
While West has been going through some things before our eyes, and most of us continuously root for him to find his way back to his former self, writer Demetria Lucas D’Oyley says it’s time we let him go.
That Kanye that we loved, who occasionally displayed a social conscious, despite his arrogance and outbursts? If it wasn’t evident at this year’s MTV Awards when the network turned over four-do-whatever-you-like-minutes of precious airtime to West and he used it, not to talk about Black Lives Matter (though he did briefly mention crime in Chicago as a segue to talk about his rich White people), or talk about the importance of voting in an election year, but to awkwardly muse on the importance of fame and to shout out his ex (who it’s obvious to anyone listening that he stiillll isn’t over), then it should be apparent now that he’s publicly cattle-calling biracial women to be the face of his brand.
The “Old Kanye,” the one that the New Kanye jokes about on The Life of Pablo, is gone. Let him go.
Maybe she’s right.
