Controversial Kanye shoots himself in the foot
Kanye West has been suspended from Instagram and Twitter over offensive posts. Picture: Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
Adidas this week became the latest brand to split with the US artist following a series of offensive and antisemitic comments and posts.
The German sports giant said his comments had been “unacceptable, hateful and dangerous, and they violate the company’s values of diversity and inclusion, mutual respect, and fairness”.
West, who has changed his name to Ye, claimed in a post he lost $2,000m in a single day after the plug was pulled on the deal, but was defiant.
“I lost two billion dollars in one day. And I’m still alive,” he posted on Instagram on Thursday, adding: “The money is not who I am. The people is who I am.
A day after the Adidas announcement, West was escorted out of the California-based headquarters of athletic shoemaker Skechers after he showed up unannounced.
The Grammy winner “arrived unannounced and without invitation” at Skechers corporate headquarters in Manhattan Beach, the company said.
“Considering Ye was engaged in unauthorised filming, two Skechers executives escorted him and his party from the building after a brief conversation,” according to a company statement.
“Skechers is not considering and has no intention of working with West,” the company said. “We condemn his recent divisive remarks and do not tolerate antisemitism or any other form of hate speech.”
The rapper has also been suspended from Instagram and Twitter over offensive posts.
The bust-up will cost Adidas a “short-term” hit of €250m to its income for this year after deciding to stop the brand’s business with immediate effect. It is to end production of items under West’s Yeezy brand and stop all payments to the musician and his companies.
In 2020, the partnership brought in nearly $1.7bn in revenue for Adidas, according to Bloomberg, and was due to expire in 2026.
The loss of revenue will be a blow to Adidas, which recently warned its profit margins and sales were taking a hit as stock piled up in warehouses because of slowing consumer demand.
But the damage to West’s personal fortune is far greater. Forbes has reported the artist is now worth $400m, down from $2bn in the magazine’s billionaires list this year. West has claimed the Adidas deal was worth more than $4bn and Forbes’ calculations were wrong.
West had previously been associated with Nike for years, bringing out the Air Yeezy in 2009, but broke away in 2013, lending his name to Adidas instead. They launched their first Yeezy shoe together in 2015 — a partnership that helped make him a billionaire.
The collaboration — which appears to have been removed from Adidas’s website with immediate effect — encompassed sportswear, jackets and trainers. However, it was the Yeezy Boost trainer that drew queues and high price tags for both new and secondhand items.
Adidas put up the deal for review after West’s controversial Paris show earlier this month at which models took to the catwalk wearing “White Lives Matter” shirts.
A few days ago, the brand launched a new version of the Yeezy Boost 350 v2 in a new colour before ending the relationship on Tuesday.
The brand said it was the sole owner of all design rights to existing products as well as previous and new colour variations under the Yeezy partnership.
Analysts said the statement indicated Adidas was likely to try to relaunch popular Yeezy products under a different brand name but it was not clear if that could replace the lost profits.
The rapper recently claimed Adidas could not drop him, despite his comments fuelling calls for a boycott. The remarks also prompted the Anti-Defamation League to call on Adidas to end its business with West.
Adidas’s move comes after Balenciaga, Gap, and JPMorgan Chase all cut ties with West after repeated antisemitic remarks. The rapper’s longtime talent agency CAA stopped representing him in the past month, according to .
Other companies to sever ties include Foot Locker and Vogue magazine. An MRC documentary about him was also scrapped.
Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald and Boston Celtics swingman Jaylen Brown terminated their associations this week with Donda Sports, the brand management agency owned by West.
Donald and Brown signed deals with Donda Sports earlier this year to represent some of their interests outside of their sports. Both star athletes emphatically dropped the agency owned by West, as the controversy surrounding his comments spread.
Donald, the three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year, signed with Donda Sports last spring after the Rams won the Super Bowl. The seven-time All-Pro and his wife, Erica, denounced West’s “displays of hate and antisemitism” in a statement announcing their decision.
West has a history of courting controversy, including a 2020 aborted run for the US presidency and claims slavery was a “choice”. However, the rapper, who has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, had until recently experienced limited repercussions over past comments.
Twitter locked West’s account on October 9 after it removed one of his tweets that said he was going “death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE”. The platform said it violated its policies against hate speech.
Facebook owner Meta restricted West’s Instagram account on October 7 after the rapper made an antisemitic post in which he appeared to suggest the rapper Diddy was controlled by Jewish people — an antisemitic trope.
The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany this week said the sportswear manufacturer had a special responsibility to cut ties with West given its history in the Nazi era.
“Adidas has to face up to its historic responsibility not just as a German company, but also as a company that was tangled up with and profited from the National Socialist dictatorship,” Josef Schuster told the tabloid newspaper .
“Since then, Adidas has done a lot to distance itself from its past,” Schuster added.
West separated from his former wife Kim Kardashian in 2020 after nearly a decade of daily headlines since they met in 2011.
It was reported after they split, West shared screenshots of explosive messages he had sent to Kardashian filing for the divorce. He went on to publicly harass the TV star.
In March, West was banned from Instagram for 24 hours after his racial remarks towards comedian Trevor Noah, who called him out for harassing Kardashian.
During the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, West went on stage while Taylor Swift was receiving the prize for “Best Female Video” and took over the mic to say that Beyoncé should have won the award.
- With additional reporting from Guardian Services, Bloomberg, and Associated Press
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