Kanye, dropping mics and announcements
September 6, 2015
It’s an exciting year for a presidential campaign and it looks like the dose of millennial we were prescribed about 20 years ago has finally kicked in. Never in American history have we seen both a business mogul/reality TV star and a highly recognized if not totally narcissistic, pop star/celebrity extraordinaire announce in the same year that they plan on running for president — that is Donald Trump and Kanye West, respectively.
At this past Sunday’s MTV Video Music Awards, West gave an emotionally charged speech to a fired-up and receptive audience. Touching on subjects of the music industry and artists supporting each other, Yeezy got down to the bare bones and the human element of being a singer/performer. It appeared that he even held back tears when he discussed his critics, saying he wasn’t “that bad after all” when being a good father to his daughter. And, before Kanye let Kanye finish, he announced a possible presidential run in 2020.
“I still don’t understand award shows,” West said, “to have artists … stand on a carpet and for the first time in their life, be put on a chopping block and have the chance to be considered a loser.”
The amount of times the word “bro” was mentioned aside, he raised some great points. Impassioned by the art he said he’d die to make in order to stand up for what he believes in, West said music has to be gritty and real sometimes.
Although the train wreck/soapbox insanity that was the 2015 VMA show led to a lot of huge issues being brought up (see: Nikki Minaj’s drag to Miley, Rebel Wilson’s joke about police brutality), Kanye laid it down like a road to Rome, where Rome is equality and the paths leading to it are truth. An abstract comparison, but valid nonetheless.
