If West’s goal was to create controversy by introducing a t-shirt that bears a white supremacist slogan, he succeeded. The rapper created a t-shirt for his YZY collection that reads: “White Lives Matter,” as opposed to the original slogan “Black Lives Matter” (BLM), which was chanted, hashtagged, and shared during protests ignited by (most notably) the death of George Floyd, a Black man who was murdered by police in Minneapolis in May of 2020.
On Monday, West revealed his “White Lives Matter” shirt, which features an image of Pope John Paul II on the front. Then on Wednesday, he doubled down on his design, saying: “Here’s my latest response when people ask me why I made a tee that says white lives matter… THEY DO,” the rapper wrote in a social media post. West also wrote in a since-deleted post: “Everyone knows that Black Lives Matter was a scam. Now it’s over. You’re welcome.”
“BREONNA TAYLOR’S MOM SAID IT FIRST: ‘I have never personally dealt with BLM Louisville and personally have found them to be fraud,” West wrote on social media. Breonna Taylor was a 26-year-old medical worker who died during a botched raid by police in March of 2020, fueling the BLM protests surrounding the death of Floyd just a couple of months later. In defense of his t-shirt, West also shared an interview with Tatishe M. Nteta, a Black professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
"Kanye West in some ways is voicing a sentiment that some aspects and portions of the American public believes and supports," Nteta told the Daily Mail. "But at the same time, Kanye West, over the course of the last few years, has expressed very conservative views. In some ways, it's not surprising."
West garnered backlash for his shirt—unsurprisingly. The family of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old who was murdered by three white supremacists in 2020 while jogging, slammed West for what they said legitimizes white supremacist behavior.
“As a result of his display, ‘White Lives Matter’ started trending in the US, which would directly support and legitimize extremist behavior, [much] like the behavior that took the life of her son,” Arbery’s mother, Wander Cooper-Jones, told Rolling Stone through her attorney Lee Merritt. Cooper-Jones added that they she was extremely disappointed in West, who had privately supported her and her family after her son was murdered.
“It’s confusing for her, it’s confusing for the families to receive his support privately, but publicly to set us all back,” Merritt said.
The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish non-governmental organization which specializes in civil rights law, called the phrase a “hate slogan,” while Will Smith’s son, Jaden Smith, immediately left the YZY SZN 9 show after seeing the shirt’s text, tweeting: “I don’t care who’s it is if I don’t feel the message I’m out.” Kendall Jenner, the ex-sister-in-law of West and his children’s aunt, “liked” Smith’s string of tweets.
Rapper Sean “Diddy” Combs came to West’s defense and labeled the fellow rapper a “super free thinker,” adding that his statements are often “misconstrued.”
Selah Marley, the daughter of Lauryn Hill (and granddaughter of Bob Marley) also defended wearing the t-shirt in West’s fashion show. The 23-year-old model said the backlash surrounding the “White Lives Matter” t-shirt was the result of “hive mentality.”
“The past 24 hours has allowed me to realize that most of yall are stuck in a hive mentality. You do what the group tells you to do and think what the group tells you to think,” Marley wrote on social media. “Witnessing someone break free from ‘the agenda’ sends you all into such a panic that you will do whatever it takes to force them back into the box that you feel they should exist in.”
“You cannot bully me, manipulate me, or coax me into silence. Nor will you bully me into being who I don’t want to be. I don’t care how many tweets you make, DMs you send, or articles you write,” she added. “Throughout all the chaos, I have yet to speak about my experience. If you know me, you know that nothing I do is without deep thought and intention. Wait til you hear what I have to say.”