Accountability in Music • Page 656

I used to enjoy Kanye's music, and to an extent, I still do. However, his recent behavior is incredibly traumatizing to victims of domestic abuse, because he's out there love bombing Kim, he's basically been putting out calls to action AGAINST Pete, he's manic, and honestly the list could go on and on. His recent actions scream emotional abuse and that's horrifying. People are like "it's just Kanye being Kanye," but I think he 100% needs to be held accountable for his actions because a) there are minors involved, b) the media is out there trying to normalize his behavior as if it's okay??? and c), this is absolutely not how to handle a very public divorce case.

This tweet says it better than I ever could.

 

Kanye has always been a jackass. It’s incredible to me that he fooled so many people for so long.

 

Not here to defend dude at all, but I think this is kind of a simplification of why many of us enjoyed his music and even looked up to him at one point. There was a long period where the mainstream narrative was simply "He's crazy!" when, in addition to making great music, he did have valuable, thoughtful things to say that were being dismissed by people who generally wouldn't give him (or sometimes, hip-hop artists in general) the time of day. I wouldn't consider myself fooled for being a fan of him and his music for a period of time. It's crushing to see someone you did look up to in more ways than one collapse into the very thing people dismissed him as for so long (a harmful egomaniac and asshole).

 

I think posting about Kanye in here can be a good thing, personally. It's more than just "Kanye is being a piece of shit once again", it's highlighting the abuse he's bringing on his ex wife and her current partner. It's straight up emotional abuse, and I think this is a good avenue to discuss how both some of the media and fans treat abuse as they are watching it unfold publicly. In addition, if someone comes in here, sees what Kanye has been doing to Kim (and Pete too) and realizes, hey, these sorts of things are also happening in my own relationship and I never realized this was emotional abuse, that's a "good" thing (in the sense that it is helping others realize they are in similar situations). Every little incident or post he makes on social media does not need to be in here, no, but a broader discussion about his abusive actions towards others, how that is perceived in the public eye, and how this is an everyday occurrence for many women who are not famous at all and have to deal with this on smaller scale, seems relevant to discuss.

 

You got fooled. It sucks. I have seen him as a useless jackass since day one. Nothing has changed for me. He just continues to confirm what I saw all along. He saw himself as a Christ figure when he was just another jackass in a long line of jackasses. He happened to have some musical talent so people overlooked the shit initially or were just fooled by the show of it all.


Edit: I don’t say any of that to say I’m like super smart or anything. I just saw through his facade right away. I guess I’m generally good at judging people, but celebrities are hard to judge. He just made it easy in my opinion.

 

nobody was fooled, he's never pretended to be anything other than himself and his flaws have always been obvious. He just started doing worse shit.

 

Eh, I dunno. Despite his flaws being obvious people still were all on his dick. It’s hard to believe some people weren’t fooled by it all.

 

This whole “You got fooled, I never was” shtick is getting really weird

 

He’s always been a contrarian and a jackass, but it was mostly more innocuous and easier to overlook in the past, rather than, I don’t know, asserting himself as a tool for a hateful and bigoted Republican regime.

 

He certainly kept digging into the jackass well as time went on.

 

It's almost turning into last week's south park episode.

 

Now THIS is where I was fooled

 

I think it’s super admirable that you own your stupidity. Being self aware in that way is really rare in stupid people. You may just be on the higher end of the stupid spectrum (clearly a scientific term).


Anyway I think this has derailed enough. I’ll go back to merely lurking in this thread.

 

Fucking classic that @Meghin types out a thoughtful response to a question that was asked and then y’all turn it into a pissing match

 

Also for what it’s worth, I think there’s value in discussing what’s happening with Kanye from a learning perspective. Plenty of people are seeing what he’s doing as just trying to get his relationship back and missing the patterns of abuse. Maybe someone was lurking and learned something, I obviously have no clue. But I do agree that when it quickly devolves to “yeah fuck that guy” or whatever the fuck just happened here it misses the point

 

Always cool when women share their trauma and are ignored

 

I mostly lurk in here but I thought this was a fantastic answer, specifically this point

 

I don't think it really makes sense to say Kanye has "always been like this" considering most of "like this" is stuff that only really exists in the cultural context of the last 5 or 6 years. A self-absorbed jackass, sure, but I think we can all agree he's gone well beyond that description at this point. Also very interested in who the long line of jackasses is? I wonder how many of them were young black rappers!

This is the point that hits for me just because, like yeah I don't think there's much value to just posting "fuck that guy" over and over but if it elucidates the ways this behavior isn't innocuous that definitely has value. I can definitely imagine situations where Kanye or whoever that we all already know is a piece of shit was doing something that didn't need to be elucidated like that - like, I don't know if we need a post every time Morrissey affirms he's a fascist (which isn't something that's happening, to be clear, just an example) - but I don't think this ongoing situation with Kanye is one of those situations.

 

No one on this website is going to be able to do anything that even resembles “holding Kanye accountable for their actions” but I already said I have no need for this thread given what it is and have no idea why I was quoted back in

 

Kind of my point and why it’s just exhausting to participate in just as an observer day in and day out and that kind of thing just leads to the deterioration of my mental health, it’s not that I don’t care about holding artists accountable, I just can’t take the useless outrage machine that churns on every time I open this thread, I don’t see a point to it. Others made very good points as to why they do and that’s totally fine too. It’s just not for me

 

I could go into detail how much I can relate to Kim right now, but I won't. It's too hard to talk about without mentally preparing myself.

But I will say that Kanye is either going to realize what he's doing is not ok, or he's going to end up getting sectioned and in a 72 hour lockdown...or worse.....and honestly, no one wants that.

 

Basically my point, I see how the new stuff Kanye has been doing recently warrants posting, sure, but most of the time the same artists this site hardly even cared about to begin with (Chris brown, MGK, Ronnie radke) are all that gets posted in this thread repeatedly. I lumped Kanye in not really thinking the stuff happening was uniquely terrible which I was clearly wrong about but I don’t think I’m way off base with my general point. Like I said, if this is gonna just be a tweet dump thread for whoever and whatever we’re supposed to be mad at today, that’s cool but not really what I want to be subjecting myself to daily

 

I get really mad when people are like "Yeah fuck Kanye" when we should be having a conversation about mental health and ways we can help each other in our own lives for those of us who have or have had a Kanye in our lives.

 

(Specifically not quoting Jake because he mentioned not wanting to be quoted, not trying to not acknowledge his post just to be clear)
Yeah I don’t know. I’ve seen all the arguments for and against the thread and I think there are valid arguments all around to an extent. Maybe it’s naive of me to hope that there are people learning here but for myself, I’m working really hard on having hope for change with these things. But yeah, even just seeing the reactions from people in regards to Kanye’s behavior towards Kim compared to the way his behavior towards Amber Rose makes me feel like there’s been some growth. I’ve said previously and still stand by the fact that the way we talk to each other in here and in other threads is straight up abysmal sometimes but as someone who posts way less than they used to, I do think there’s been some learning.

 

it’s frustrating because so many of us have been in abusive relationships and the hardest thing i deal with accepting that most people dont care to hold kanye accountable. i agree there has to be productive conversation so we can support each other.