Update [10/9/22 at 7:08 P.M.]: Ye has been suspended from Instagram and Twitter after making antisemitic remarks on the platform. “The account in question has been locked due to a violation of Twitter’s policies,” a representative for Twitter told BuzzFeed News.
Original story: It was only a matter of time before the artist formerly known as Kanye West got around to the Jews. The centerpiece of any good conspiracy, Judiasm has long been on the periphery of West’s chosen conspiracy circles, who turn to it at times of great strife when he and his cohort need to rile people up. Whether its the time the Trump team made a dog-whistle sound like a bullhorn and posted that image of Hillary Clinton surrounded by money and a big ol’ Star Of David on his Twitter in the summer of 2016 or the time Elon Musk tweeted, “Who do you think owns the press” in 2018, the Jews are good scapegoat when you need to play to a base that lives in a toilet bowl.
It all began on Friday when Ye posted a screenshot of a text message conversation between himself and P. Diddy on Instagram. In the image, West threatened to use Diddy as “an example to show the Jewish people that told you to call me that no one can threaten or influence me.” After the post went live to West’s 18 million followers, Meta’s moderators suspended the rapper. So Kanye “took to Twitter” to post a picture of him and his frenemy (and noted Jewish person Mark Zuckerberg) doing some karaoke. Then things got serious. In response to an article in Forbes about the suspension, Ye decided to go bargain-hunting for antisemitic tropes.
“I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going death con 3 [sic] on JEWISH PEOPLE,” a since-deleted tweet from Ye reads. “The funny thing is I actually can’t be Anti Semitic because Black people are actually Jew also. You guys have toyed with and tried to black ball anyone whoever opposes your agenda.”
Of course, Ye’s assertions are some of the oldest and stalest anti-Jew rhetoric. Come on, Kanye. You’re supposed to be the world’s most creative individual, on par with Da Vinci, and the best you got is some Alex Jones bargain bin trash like this? Although to be fair, he did throw in a reference to the Black Israelites to shake things up. Since the early 20th century, the so-called International Jewish Conspiracy has asserted that Jews control the media and the banks in hopes of explaining why things aren’t going well for bigots. He picked a great time to do it because antisemitism has never been more popular in the U.S. Last year, the ADL found 2,717 reports of antisemitic attacks in the United States, an increase of 34%. For his part, West was only sharing his debunked beliefs with 31 million followers.
Sadly, this is Ye’s bread and butter these days. When he isn’t disappointing fans of his music with lackluster double albums that he seemingly couldn’t figure out how to start or finish, he’s stoking obnoxious, hurtful, and hateful controversies that serve no one except his ego. Aligning himself with some of America’s most ghoulish in the week leading up to his anti-Jew posting last night, Ye wore a “White Lives Matter” shirt to his Yeezy Season 9 show in Paris. Later, he appeared on America’s favorite firehose of hate, Tucker Carlson Tonight. The rapper told Carlson that he thought the shirt was “funny.”
And with that, we open yet another sad and predictable chapter in Ye’s ongoing decade-long public downfall. Antisemitism is a marker we’ve all assumed he’d clear for a while now, and it’s nice to see him, once again, meet our expectations.
At least this guy isn’t opening schools. Oh, wait.