Connect with us

Hi, what are you looking for?

News

A Timeline of the Consequences Ye Has Faced for His ‘WLM’ Shirts & Antisemitic Hate Speech

Ye (formerly Kanye West) is facing very public reckoning. The “Hurricane” rapper made headlines at his Yeezy Paris Fashion Week show on Oct. 3, 2022, for wearing a shirt emblazoned with the phrase “White Lives Matter” on its back, and featuring Black models in the shirt. The phrase is one that was adopted by neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups in response to the Black Lives Matter movement, and the rapper has been facing backlash from both fans and celebrities online.

But the controversy did not stop for there for Ye, who has doubled down on his comments on Instagram and later took to Twitter (now X) to use antisemitic rhetoric in his posts, then continued to amplify his hate speech in interviews. The reaction from the public was swift, with several companies — including The Gap, Balenciaga and more — terminating their relationships and brand deals with the rapper.

Forbes reported that Ye has lost his billionaire status after Adidas announced Oct. 25, 2022, that it was dropping his deal, and that the brand does not tolerate hate speech. The move, according to the publication, put Ye’s net worth at $400 million and resulted in his removal from Forbes‘ billionaires list.

Since then, Adidas has opened an internal investigation after several former employees accused West of inappropriate workplace conduct during meetings with Adidas employees. People in his orbit, from former girlfriend Julia Fox to collaborator Pusha T, have also distanced themselves from him. Furthermore, Ye’s Nov. 22, 2022, dinner with Donald Trump and white nationalist Nick Fuentes was widely denounced, even by Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence.

From brands and scrapped documentaries, to airplay declines of his music catalogue and more, here are the consequences Kanye West has faced due to his “WLM” and continued antisemitic remarks and hate speech.

*Editor’s Note: After an Oct. 8, 2022, tweet in which he announced he was going “death con [sic] 3 on Jewish people,” Kanye West (Ye) has repeatedly doubled down on antisemitic hate speech, even going so far as to praise Hitler, a man responsible for the systematic murder of six million Jews during the Holocaust. This arrives at a troubling time when antisemitism is on the rise, with the Anti-Defamation League noting a 34% year-over-year increase in antisemitic incidents (assault, harassment and vandalism) in America in 2021. Many companies have cut business ties with the rapper/fashion designer, while numerous musicians, friends and politicians have condemned his comments.

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You May Also Like

News

National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) president/CEO David Israelite joined the Association of Independent Music Publishers (AIMP) to give his annual State of Music Publishing...

News

Johnny Tillotson, the Grammy-nominated country and pop singer behind the iconic hit, “Poetry In Motion,” died on Tuesday (April 1). He was 86 years...

News

SOCAN, Canada’s largest member-owned music rights organization, turns 100 this year. It’s celebrating with a major milestone — but also issuing a warning to...

News

Billboard Women in Music 2025 The calendar has turned to April. With quarter 1 of 2025 officially in the rear view, which was a...