You can’t make this up … Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, used a Super Bowl ad on Sunday night to promote his website, which is now selling controversial T-shirts featuring a swastika, a symbol associated with Nazi Germany and modern-day extremist groups.
So, he paid millions of dollars for Super Bowl ad space to sell white tees with swastikas? What the actual hell?
Yes, the T-shirts, which are white with a black swastika on the front, were the only items listed on the homepage of Yeezy.com as of Monday morning. The shirts, labeled “HH-01,” are priced at $20, with no explanation or text provided on the site.
$20 bucks to don a shirt representing NAZIS! The same Nazis America and allied forces destroyed in the 1940s during WW2. The same Nazis who served Adolf Hitler. Smh.
The Super Bowl ad, which reportedly aired in the Los Angeles area but was not shown nationally, features Ye in a dentist’s chair, seemingly undergoing treatment.
He briefly addresses the audience, saying, “So what’s up, guys? I spent, like, all the money for the commercial on these new teeth. So once again, I had to shoot it on the iPhone. Um, um, um, go to yeezy.com.” The swastika T-shirts were not mentioned during the ad.
Ye’s actions have been met with widespread criticism. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) condemned the sale of the shirts, stating that the swastika symbol, which Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime adopted, continues to serve as a powerful emblem of hate and fear, particularly among far-right groups. The ADL also pointed out that the “HH-01” label could be interpreted as a reference to “Heil Hitler.”
As of Monday morning, Ye’s X (formerly Twitter) account had 33 million followers and was deactivated.
Some might say – good riddance. Some.
This follows a series of antisemitic posts he made on the platform in recent days. In one of his last tweets before the account was taken offline, Ye said, “I’m logging out of twitter. I appreciate Elon for allowing me to vent. It has been very cathartic to use the world as a sounding board.” Ye had previously been locked out of Twitter in 2022 over antisemitic remarks.
Before the shirts appearing on Yeezy.com, Ye had stated on X that he would never sell such a shirt, citing concerns about the potential for harm. “I would never sell a swastika tee because people could be physically harmed wearing it … I love my fans and supporters,” he wrote just days before the T-shirts went on sale.
This time guesses he’s not worried too much about his fans and customers getting the ol’ punch a Nazi in the face, Inglorious Basterds style treatment.
Ye’s recent actions and comments have sparked significant backlash, with many organizations and individuals denouncing his remarks and the sale of the swastika T-shirts.
Just wow.
