Kanye West: Illness Doesn't Justify Hatred of Jews

Enlarge image

Kanye West: Crossed borders several times in two weeks

Photo: Gotham/GC Images/Getty Images

Last Saturday, rapper and music producer Kanye West posted a message via Twitter via his account with 31.4 million followers that could be interpreted in at least two ways: "I'm a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I' m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE«.

This translates to: "I'm a little tired tonight, but when I wake up I'll go on yellow alert with JEWISH PEOPLE."

That would be the naïve interpretation, because in a perfidious play on words, West did not write DEFCON 3 (i.e. the increased operational readiness of the military, which was declared in the USA after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001), but »death con« – what is known as »death level« – that is, an overt threat of violence.

In both cases a Jewish threat is evoked.

That was the culmination of a multi-day escalation by the fashion designer, who now goes by the short name Ye, and used to produce great music in an old life.

The irritation began last week with Paris Fashion Week on Monday, where he presented his Yeezy Season 9 collection.

One of his T-shirts caused outrage around the world: flocked on the front with the stylized face of Pope John Paul II and the words »Seguiremos tu Ejemplo« (»We will follow your example«), the back reads »White Lives Matter« – »white lives matter«.

With this sentence you shouldn't pretend to be more ignorant than you are.

This is a statement on discourse shifts through provocation, as we typically know from the American alt-right movement.

The slogan was used in 2015 by white supremacy supporters as a racist response to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Groups like the Ku Klux Klan or the Aryan Renaissance Society also used this phrase.

The fact that West Trump is revered and close to the extreme right in the USA is not new information, and so it was not surprising that he posed at the fashion show in Paris with arch-conservative Trump apologist, Republican political influencer and gun defender Candace Owens, who is his wore a t-shirt.

After facing heavy criticism, West explained in an Instagram story: "Everyone knows that the Black Lives Matter movement was a scam.

Now it's over.

You are welcome."

"Don't play with the 'Black lives matter'"

A few days later, West posted screenshots of text messages he sent to rapper P. Diddy, real name Sean Combs.

The exchange between the two ends with West's conspiracy ideological statement that Jews allegedly asked Combs to call him.

An interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson also aired in two parts on Thursday and Friday, in which West presented his views on the world situation.

In a two-hour conversation, he announced, among other things, that he believes the body positivity movement is a media-driven conspiracy to kill black people;

and he also touched on his t-shirt, explaining that he just found the idea funny: an African American guy with "White Lives Matter" written on the back.

On Saturday, West's Instagram account was provisionally suspended.

West consequently returned to Twitter, where he hadn't posted in nearly two years.

Elon Musk greeted him with »Welcome back to Twitter, my friend!«.

The next day, West was also banned from Twitter - after he had just announced "death con 3 on all Jewish people".

Yesterday, VICE Magazine published excerpts from the above-mentioned interview with Tucker Carlson, which Fox News edited before it was broadcast.

In these, West explains that Planned Parenthood (the US abortion counseling and contraception NGO that also became the German association Pro Familia) was created "to control the Jewish population."

Elsewhere, he laments that the school his children attend celebrates the complicated African-American festival of Kwanzaa — although he would rather they celebrate the Jewish festival of Hanukkah so they would at least learn about financial engineering.

Hopefully I don't need to explain the subtext here.

More than just a manic episode

But at the latest when he explains in this unpublished part of the interview »I have visions that God keeps giving me about building communities and how to build these free kinetic energy communities«, one cannot avoid it, with all his unbearable resentment also his to question mental health.

Known to have a mental illness, his now-ex-wife Kim Kardashian has spoken out publicly about his diagnosis of bipolar disorder.

And while the failures of recent years have been noted with surprise, but with an effort to understand them, his affect disorder - for example when he claimed in 2018 that African Americans had voluntarily allowed themselves to be enslaved for 400 years - now it seems as follows from this chronology over the past two weeks, far too many boundaries have been crossed far too violently to dismiss or ignore this as a manic episode.

"The question of a specific action or behavior, whether 'my brain made me do it,' it was me or my illness, is usually just too involved and difficult," said Steve Hyman, Harvard professor and director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at Broad Institute at MIT, the Washington Post in the case of Kanye West.

“Courts fight it all the time.

It is often impossible to find a proper distinction between a person as he or she would have been had he not been ill and the influence of mental illness.'

When a mania sets in

Expand the Early Warning Signs area

Even before a manic phase begins, the first signs appear in the behavior of those affected.

Such warning signals should be taken seriously, because the earlier the developing mania is recognized, the better it can be slowed down by drug treatment and its possible damage limited.

The precursor symptoms are different for everyone, but some are particularly common and are considered typical early warning signs:

Expand the Greatly reduced need for sleep area

Some suddenly only sleep a few hours at night, some even stay awake for several days in a row.

Despite an acute lack of sleep, they feel energetic.

ExpandOveractive Behavior area

Those affected can no longer sit still for long and always have to do or undertake something.

They also find it difficult to concentrate on one task for longer.

Quick speech pop-up area

It is not uncommon for those affected to speak particularly quickly in the early stages of mania and jump more often from one thought to the next without there having to be any connection in terms of content.

Expand areaLoose Handling

The inhibition to speak to strangers is reduced.

Those affected appear unusually open and relaxed when interacting with one another, and it is not uncommon for them to behave in a cross-border manner.

Nevertheless, racism and anti-Semitism are not symptoms of a mental illness.

While bipolar disorder suspends social self-control, it can also simply bring out what was already there.

Considering that bipolar mood disorder, which can produce impulsiveness and paranoia and lower or eliminate inhibitions, could be a factor in these outbursts, one cannot make the mistake of excusing them.

This means: One can acknowledge a person's illness and at the same time have to take their misanthropy seriously, because a sick person can also be held responsible for crossing borders.

A certain mental condition does not exempt West from the moral or legal consequences of his behavior either.

Mentally ill is also possible without racism

The fact that beliefs and illness can and should be separated can also be seen in the following simple equation: There are people who are mentally ill and behave neither racistly nor anti-Semitically.

And there are people who make racist and anti-Semitic statements and not all of them are mentally ill.

Whether it is about conviction or mania is irrelevant for the effect of his words anyway: his statements are well received, the damage is done.

He has a structurally influential network, with friends like Trump and Musk, and he can spread his ideas, whether in pop culture through his work as a musician and fashion designer, or in conservative American politics with his infatuated megaphones like Fox host Tucker Carlson .

They all benefit from a sick man and from a man with discriminatory views.

It is to be hoped that he will receive and accept help that will protect him from himself in psychotic episodes - and groups of people from his attacks.