To say that Ye, the rap superstar and fashion mogul formerly known as Kanye West, is no stranger to controversy is like saying that the pole in a New York City subway car is no stranger to germs. Nevertheless, despite years of inflammatory statements and bizarre antics, Ye now finds himself in a maelstrom of his own making after declaring himself a “Nazi” and doubling down on his previously disavowed antisemitism. In the past few weeks, Ye unleashed a flurry of bigoted statements on X, followed by a baffling Super Bowl commercial directing viewers to his Yeezy website where only a single item was for sale: a t-shirt emblazoned with a swastika.
In response, Ye was dropped by talent agency 33 & West “due to his harmful and hateful remarks,” agent Daniel McCarthy said on Instagram. Shortly thereafter, Ye’s website was taken offline by retail platform Shopify for failing to “engage in authentic commerce practices,” the company said in a statement. That same day, an unnamed former employee sued Ye, alleging he had “carried out a calculated campaign to threaten and psychologically torment Jewish people around him.” Simultaneously, Ye’s “one-time chief of staff” quit “shortly after” the rapper defended fellow embattled mogul Sean “P.Diddy” Combs, who has been accused of abuse, said Rolling Stone. Ye and wife Bianca Censori have each “reached out to divorce attorneys” in the past week as well, TMZ said. While Ye has weathered similarly contentious moments before, these latest scandals have raised the prospect that his hateful and outlandish behavior may finally take a lasting toll on the once unstoppable-seeming superstar.
“Here we go again,” said Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt in a statement condemning Ye. The ADL had previously tracked “30 antisemitic incidents nationwide,” which were “tied to” Ye’s 2022 antisemitic outburst, Greenblatt said. “We know this game all too well.”
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
Sign up for The Week’s Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
As a celebrity, Ye is “still firmly raised on a platform of society’s making,” said Juno Kelly at Culted, although his most recent antisemitic rant “may have been the final straw.” While he will “undoubtedly maintain impunity” among diehard fans, his “slow and non-linear” descent may mean the A-lister is “destined to forever haunt the margins, scrambling for relevance through hate speech and problematic stunts.”
Perhaps the most acute sign of Ye’s decline in stature is the apparent recent cancellation of his planned appearance on megapopular streamer Kai Cenat’s platform. Addressing the “elephant in the room,” Cenat said late last week, he repeatedly used the gamer term “GGs” to imply the planned collaboration was over. “I seen the tweets. I don’t know what’s going on, bro.”
For the rapper’s inner circle, however, Ye’s “bizarre and sometimes alarming antics come as no surprise,” said Page Six. “Neither does his continuing popularity.” Despite getting dropped by multiple partner brands and losing his management after his 2022 antisemitic outbursts, Ye still has “definitively not been canceled by fans.”
What next?
Ye’s reputation has “once again taken a hit as he faces backlash for his posting spree,” said Rolling Stone, but his “latest antics” suggest “something larger” at play. Mental health circumstances aside, Ye remains “remains deftly perceptive of the zeitgeist” — one in which popular culture has been “drifting towards the far right.” For as long as Ye “continues making music,” said Vulture, “he’ll be able to find willing collaborators in the industry.” Those collaborators, however, “can’t say they didn’t know what they were getting into.”
Ye has made sure people know he remains unrepentant over his latest controversies, in “stark contrast to an apology he made in 2023,” said The New York Times. As the rapper said in his latest social media spree: “I’m never apologizing for my Jewish comments.” He is set to release his next album “in the summer,” The Guardian said. His last two albums, released after his previous antisemitism scandal, “reached No. 1 and No. 2 in the U.S. chart, respectively.”
