Last Monday night, I saw Lil Wayne trending on Twitter. New music, I thought? Wrong. I was so wrong.
Aside from the fact that Wayne looked like he could hardly keep his eyes open in the interview (say no to drugs, children), for the sake of this article we’ll look past that. My entire timeline was in an uproar over Wayne’s comments. People’s hot takes on the Nightline interview ranged from “how could he say something like that” to “who cares about Lil Wayne’s stance on anything”. I understood why people were taking a Dave Chappelle “Where is Ja?” stance on his comments, but I also understood why so many of us were disappointed to hear those words come from his mouth: how could someone who’s been so vocal about racism suddenly decide that it didn’t exist anymore?
A quick history lesson: Lil Wayne was born in 1982 and he’s from the Hollygrove neighborhood of New Orleans, Louisiana. Hollygrove is a low-income neighborhood with more than half of its residents making less than $25,000 a year. Crime rates are high and today the neighborhood is still struggling from the effects of Hurricane Katrina. When he was 15 he joined Hot Boys, a group managed by Cash Money Records. Lil Wayne released his first album Tha Block is Hot when he was 17, and the rest is history. We now know him to be one of the most successful and popular rappers of all time.
Many people pointed out that Wayne’s basically been rich since he was a teen and therefore has never experienced racism. That sounds good on paper, except for the fact that Wayne’s music contradicts that statement. Even though Lil Wayne may have moved on from Hollygrove a long time ago, up until recently he’s always spoken out against racism and police brutality. One of his most popular (in my opinion) socially aware songs “Georgia Bush” is a harsh criticism of then president’s George W. Bush and the federal government’s handling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Georgia Bush also includes some theories about the levees being blown up in order to destroy the lower income, almost entirely black populations of New Orleans such as Hollygrove. A year after Katrina, Wayne released a song called “Cry Out” that talks candidly about police brutality. Oh yeah, and in 2012 he complained that he wasn’t allowed to attend the Oklahoma City Thunder basketball game because he was black. And wait a minute, is this a black lives matter chant at his concert earlier this year? Very fishy.
We live in a (mostly) free country. Lil Wayne doesn’t have to be on the Black Lives Matter mailing list. Nobody’s saying that any and every black famous person has to wholeheartedly agree with the Black Lives Matter movement: however, to imply that nobody suffers from racism and police brutality because you’re a “young, black, rich motherfucka being filmed by a white man” is foolish and selfishly forgets the less rich black and non-black motherfuckas who continue to face injustice to this day.
Truly, I’m not sure what made Lil Wayne have this sudden change of heart. Maybe he’s trying to keep his white fan base happy; maybe he’s trying to protect his sponsorships. All I know is that whatever fantasy island Lil Wayne is currently living on sounds like a great getaway vacation, and that he should probably stop giving interviews and stay there forever.