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Lil Wayne … ‘My life matter’
Lil Wayne on stage this summer … ‘My life matter.’ Photograph: Rich Fury/AP
Lil Wayne on stage this summer … ‘My life matter.’ Photograph: Rich Fury/AP

Lil Wayne says Black Lives Matter has 'nothing to do with me'

This article is more than 7 years old

Rapper appears on US television to insist explicitly that his success proves America understands young, black men

Lil Wayne has distanced himself from the Black Lives Matter movement, saying: “I don’t feel connected to a damn thing that ain’t got nothin’ to do with me. If you do, you crazy as shit … Feeling connected to something that ain’t got nothin’ to do with you? If it ain’t got nothin’ to do with me, I ain’t connected to it.”

The Grammy-winning rapper was interviewed on ABC’s Nightline on US television on Tuesday night, and said he felt instances of police violence against black people should not be treated as a collective phenomemon. “That just sounds weird, I don’t know, that you put a name on it. It’s not a name, it’s not ‘whatever, whatever’. It’s somebody got shot by a policeman for a fucked-up reason.”

In September, Wayne had said “there is no such thing as racism” on Fox Sports. Last month, he clarified that comment, saying that his life had been saved by a white police officer when he was 12, and so: “I don’t know what racism is … I have never witnessed racism.”

In the new interview, he further distanced himself from the notion that black people in America suffer systemic racism. “I am a young, black motherfucker,” he said. “If that don’t tell you that America understand black motherfuckers matter these days, I don’t know what it.”

He added: “My life matter. Especially to my bitches.”

The interview ended with Wayne removing his microphone and walking off set, saying: “I ain’t no fuckin’ politician.”

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