Queer rapper Le1f has hit out at Macklemore and Ryan Lewis following their Video Music Awards wins for Best Hip-Hop Video and Best Video With a Social Message for their gay rights anthem Same Love, with the rapper claiming “gay people don’t care about your video about gay people”.
New Yorker Le1f took to Twitter to unleash his outburst, suggesting that there’s something a little uncouth about a straight, white man making money off a song about gay inter-racial love, saying “I’m gonna write a song about disabled people, or about the Aboriginal struggle. Cuz Mama needs a new fur coat. Oh wait, that’s evil.”
He also accused the duo of ripping him off musically, which one can only assume refers to the similarities between his song Wut and Macklemore’s smash Thrift Shop – you can compare the two below.
Le1f has since deleted his tweets, screencapped below. It’s a shame, because this could have been a great time to start a conversation about cultural appropriation but the whole situation seems to have been overshadowed by #twerkgate. And with so many Miley GIFs to be made and so little time, we can’t really blame you.
To Macklemore’s credit, he recently acknowledged that he has a whole lot of white privilege, saying that he wouldn’t have had the same level of success if he was black.
(via Flavorwire)
Watch: Le1f – Wut
Watch: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis – Thrift Shop
