Reacting to the death of George Floyd, rapper Lil Wayne said Friday that folks need to be “very specific” when reacting to perceived injustices, warning not to blame the “entire force” or an “entire race.”
Wayne, whose real name is Dwayne Michael Carter, Jr., noted that he’s unimpressed by “hashtag” and “t-shirt” activism if you don’t actually help the person you’re claiming to get justice for.
The rapper also implored activists to “know” what they’re “protesting about” before they advocate a cause. “It’s a bunch of facts that we think we know that we don’t know,” he said.
“I think when we see these situations, I think we also have to understand that we have to get very specific,” Wayne told rapper Fat Joe via Instagram Live, according to Rap Up. “We have to get so specific and what I mean by that, we have to stop viewing it from such a broad view, meaning we have to stop placing the blame on the whole force and the whole everybody of a certain race or everybody with a badge.”
“We have to get into who that person is,” he continued. “If we want to place the blame on anybody, it should be ourselves for not doing more than what we think we’re doing.”
Wayne noted that he’s often questioned about his apparent silence on some issues, seemingly referring to racial issues.
“The reason people always ask me why you don’t say this, why you don’t do that, what else am I gonna do after that?” he explained. “Some people put a tweet out and they think they did something. Some people wear a shirt, they think they did something.”
“I mean, what you gon’ do after that?” Wayne emphasized. “Did you actually help the person? Did you actually help the family? Did you actually go out and do something?”
“If I ain’t about to do all that, then I ain’t about to do nothing,” he said. “I pray for them.”
The 37-year-old added that protesters should understand what they are advocating for, noting of heavy misconceptions among activists.
“What we need to do, we need to learn about it more,” he said. “If we want to scream about something, know what we’re screaming about. You wanna protest about something, know what we protesting about.”
“It’s a bunch of facts that we think we know that we don’t know,” Wayne added. “If we want to get into it, know what we talkin’ about before we talk about it.”
During an appearance on Fox Sports’ “Undisputed” in 2016, Wayne expressed that he was unimpressed with then-NFL QB Colin Kaepernick’s national anthem protest, said that he’s never experienced racism, and described how a white cop saved his life years ago.
“It’s the man’s decision,” Wayne said of Kaepernick’s protest. “I’m not into it enough to even give an opinion. So when he did it, someone had to tell me why he was doing it, that’s how much I didn’t know what was going on. And I kind of still don’t.”
“I have never dealt with racism, and I’m glad I didn’t have to,” he continued. “I don’t know if it’s because of my blessings… but it is my reality. I thought it was over; I still believe it’s over. But obviously it isn’t.”
“[Racism] is not cool to them,” Wayne said of younger generations, “it’s so not cool, it doesn’t even matter to them.”
The rapper then recalled: “That day that I shot myself, the police…came through there; they knocked the doors down; I was on the floor; they hopped over me, looking for the drugs. It was a white police that ran up and stopped, and said, ‘What the f*ck are ya’ll doing? Do you not see this baby on the floor?’ … He picked me up, bought me to the hospital himself. He was white.”
That same year, Wayne ripped Black Lives Matter activists.
“What is it? What do you mean?” he said when asked about the activist group. “That just sounds weird, I don’t know that you put a name on. It’s not a name…It’s not ‘whatever, whatever.’ It’s somebody got shot by police for a f***ed up reason.”
“I am a young black rich motherf***er, if that don’t let you know that America understand black mothe rf***ers matters these days, I don’t know what it is,” he said. “That man white, he filmin’ me. I’m a n*****. I don’t know what you don’t come to me with that dumb s*** ma’am.”
“I don’t feel connected to a damn thing that ain’t got nothin’ to do with me,” added Wayne. “I’m connected to this mother f***ing flag right here.”
WATCH:
Lil Wayne speaks on the murder in Minneapolis of George Floyd, he says we should blame ourselves for it
(@FatJoe Show) pic.twitter.com/DqYrCypHJl
— Complex Ambition (@ComplexAmbition) May 29, 2020
Related: WATCH: Lil Wayne Says Racism Is ‘Over,’ Praises White Cop Who Saved Him
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