By: Amanda Anderson-Niles
Kendrick Lamar caught a lot of backlash after he told Billboard that African-Americans can’t expect respect from police officers when we don’t respect each other, but the Compton emcee is addressing the backlash in a recent interview with Hot 97.
K Dot feels his words were taken out of context. He says:
“I forgive them, period because obviously they don’t understand where I come from. They don’t understand what I’ve been through. They don’t understand what I’ve done to my community to tear it down.
“For them to take my words out of context…yeah I forgive them because when I speak, I speak for self first. When I say respect, I mean I still deal with that. Just because I’m in the limelight don’t mean I still don’t have animosity towards this gang over here. They just killed two of my homeboys on tour.
“I still feel that hatred. I still feel like not respecting them just because they have a different rag or a different flag rather than looking at them like they’re a black man, I respect you because of that.”
He also demands his words never be misconstrued again:
“I demand this. Don’t never take my words out of context. Cause I’m the only one…it’s a few out there that’s really speaking from the streets…for every urban neighborhood in the world. I forgive you.”
Check out the interview below. The Mike Brown/Eric Garner talk comes in at the 21:00 mark.
Don’t get mad at us for telling you your a-s was wrong. You’re still wrong shawty.
Sigh…Whatever. Anyway, I’m still enjoying his album. I feel like he is going to be a milder Kanye. Annoying personality, but makes great music.
Agreed.
Cosign.
I’m just going to have to agree t disagree with him. That’s all there is to it.
So he’s in a gang himself. Interesting. Well I still like his music. But I think he really missed the point people were trying to show him about why what he said wasn’t helpful.
Kendrick has always rapped about his time in and around gangs. But he doesn’t promote it or try to make it seem cool like someone like YG.
*side eye*
I get what he was trying to say. I grew up in the same area he did, and the gang life will make you real resentful of your own people sometimes. It’s not right, but we’re human. You lose enough people and you’ll have the same mindset too. I think it just takes growth to see things differently.
LOL. I don’t think anyone was asking for his forgiveness.
He is lying if his words were taken out of context why did it take him so long to say something about it.
I don’t think anyone misconstrued what he said. We just held him accountable for his ignorance and I guess he feels some kind of way about it.
The more he talks, the less I like him. How disappointing.
Just going to leave this here…
“I wish somebody would look in our neighborhood knowing that it’s already a situation, mentally, where it’s f–ked up. What happened to [Michael Brown] should’ve never happened. Never. But when we don’t have respect for ourselves, how do we expect them to respect us? It starts from within. Don’t start with just a rally, don’t start from looting — it starts from within.” – Kendrick Lamar to Billboard Magazine
He acts like his quote was too complex to understand. It was victim blaming. Period. But he’s not the only conservative person from the hood. A lot of them share this mindset.
I think he was really referring to Azealia Banks. He picked her to be on his album and then removed her from the roster after she dragged him on Twitter.
Wow I didn’t even think about that. No wonder he looked slightly angry and annoyed when he said this.
*blank stare* Whet?
He tries way too hard to be deep. I still like him but sometimes he annoys me. Nobody misunderstood him. We understood exactly what he said and he just turned right around and said it again in this interview.