By Kyler Jacobson, Staff Writer
The discussion surrounding the murder of George Floyd has been brought into the world’s attention once again, as Kanye (‘Ye’) West and Candace Owens have both stated that particular claims about the cause of his death are untrue. Kanye spoke of Floyd’s murder on the “Drink Champs” podcast where he said, “They hit him with the fentanyl. If you look, the guy’s knee wasn’t even on his neck like that.”
Owens, on the other hand, spent her time creating a documentary titled, ‘The Greatest Lie Ever Sold’, where she attempted to paint a picture of Floyd as a drug addict that was aware of his problem and Derek Chauvin (the police officer who murdered Floyd) as a “nice guy” who wouldn’t have it in him to murder someone as he did.
These types of comments from public figures are extremely damaging to the memories of these tragedies because it encourages inaccurate statements from certain groups, who try to gaslight minorities’ struggles by undermining what they grappled with in society and the real stories about what happened to them.
That these two deliberately belittle the struggles of marginalized communities (some of which they are part of) to side with lawmakers and politicians that will not help to aid in the dismantling of those systematic struggles, is disheartening, to say the least.
Kanye was the most disappointing to see, not only because we’re used to these types of opinions and actions from Owens but also because of Kanye’s past with speaking about change and racism in his songs to now being at a point in his life that he’s siding with racism and hate.
It’s even crazier when you find out that Kanye donated $2 million to Floyd’s family in June 2020 when he was murdered, showing the damage a documentary like Owens’ can do to the opinions of a group of people.
Bringing up this tragedy two years later and trying to denounce what has been factually proven, only retraumatizes the family of George Floyd and spreads false information about the murder of an innocent person. Then trying to connect his death and the Black Lives Matter movement as the “greatest lie ever sold” is simply unbelievable.
The struggles of the Black community angered many people in this country and that’s why many stood together to fight police brutality and racism. They don’t have it easy getting people to take their struggles seriously because, in actuality, they’re still trying to convince people like West and Owens who seem fixated on creating a new narrative.