Music from Kendrick Lamar's critically acclaimed album To Pimp A Butterfly has become a big part of the Black Lives Matter movement.
But before that happened, K.Dot made comments that seemed to be at odds with the movement's message.
"But when we don’t have respect for ourselves, how do we expect them to respect us?" K.Dot said about the Michael Brown shooting during a January 2015 interview with Billboard.His lyrics on the TPAB cut 'The Blacker The Berry' also suggest he may have a different point of view than the BLM folks, especially the part when he says it's hypocritically to focus on Trayvon Martin's death, but ignore black on black gang violence.
"So why did I weep when Trayvon Martin was in the street?/ When gang banging make me kill a nigga blacker than me?/ Hypocrite!" he raps.K.Dot clarified those lyrics in a new interview with NPR.
"It’s not me pointing at my community; it’s me pointing at myself,” said Kendrick. “I don’t talk about these things if I haven’t lived them, and I’ve hurt people in my life. It’s something I still have to think about when I sleep at night ... "The message I'm sending to myself — I can't change the world until I change myself first."Check out the interview below:
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