At the launch of the George Floyd protests last week, Lil Wayne gave his opinion about people becoming vocal about police brutality. “We have to stop viewing it with such a broad view, meaning we have to stop placing the blame on the whole force and the whole everybody or a certain race or everybody with a badge.” Lil Wayne added at the time, “We have to actually get into who that person is. And if we want to place the blame on anybody, it should be ourselves for not doing more than what we think we’re doing.”
Aaron Davidson / Stringer / Getty Images
The rapper received an onslaught of backlash from fans, foes, and his fellow celebrities, but on Friday’s (June 5) episode of Young Money Radio, the rapper told Killer Mike that people have to understand how he was raised to get why he made the comments that he did. “Mike, last week people misinterpreted my words,” Lil Wayne began. “I respect the effort of the people to seek justice and what they doin’. I just knew it was time for more action than a tweet. Also, my mama always told me—I sat in the passenger seat getting picked up from school every day and dropped off. I would look outside that window in the ‘hood, so you gon’ see situations when you riding home. I might make a comment or give my opinion on what I just saw.”
Weezy said his mother would give him a swift smack in the mouth. “Mind you f*ckin’ business,” he remembered his mother telling him. “Mind your business. You don’t even ask, ‘Why you smack me? Why I need to mind my business?’ But you know one thing, I need to mind my damn business. So, for folks out there that figure that whatever, Wayne gon’ say this or… Listen. I’m from New Orleans, understand. I’m from New Orleans where, what we’re seeing ladies and gentlemen around the world finally because [of] the cameraphones and all that, baby, we went through that every day. We saw that, we went through that every week. We gave police names, just cause of who they were and how they were, and we got used to that… That was the system. That’s what I grew up in. So, don’t blame me, don’t fault me. But if you do, you already know.”
Killer Mike agreed with Lil Wayne, adding that where he’s from, things were the same way so he didn’t fault him for making the remarks that he did. They spoke about ways that creatives and celebrities can help organize and become community leaders, including encouraging their followers to patronize certain lesser-known, black-owned businesses.
