R&B singer Erykah Badu, who hasn’t put out a record since 2010, was trending Wednesday and not in a good way: She suggested in an interview that maybe Hitler wasn’t all bad, in part because he was a “wonderful painter.”
She said this in a long interview with Vulture published Wednesday, in which she talked about many subjects, including her 2008 visit to Israel where she said she supported the Palestinian cause and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, despite his alleged anti-Semitism.
“I’m OK with anything I had to say about Louis Farrakhan,” she told her interlocutor, David Marchese. “But I’m not an anti-Semitic person. I don’t even know what anti-Semitic was before I was called it. I’m a humanist. I see good in everybody. I saw something good in Hitler.”
Apparently stupified, Marchese responded: “Come again?”
“Yeah, I did. Hitler was a wonderful painter,” Badu said.
“No, he wasn’t!” Marchese snapped back. Even if he were, he said, what does that have to do with whether there’s any “good” in him?
Black people mad over what #ErykahBadu said about Hitler, as if Jews weren't racist towards black people either. Yes everybody has good in them, its just they choose not to aim their good towards you. Be grateful to those that do. And its an opinion u dnt hv to like it
— H.I.M.😎😘 (@SeanPeace22) January 24, 2018
I don’t think there’s wrong with trying to see the good in everybody but like Hitler…you had to know that was gonna bother people. Because he killed 6 million people. And Bill Cosby girl…you know our relationship with him is strained. Because he’s a rapist. #ErykahBadu
— Lici (@blahhhlicia) January 24, 2018
I feel like #ErykahBadu and I are spirit sisters. I too, see the human in people. And, tend not to follow the crowds thoughts.
— M.P. DeVille (@Cajunwealth) January 24, 2018
Hitler was a sociopath. Sociopaths lack the very thing that makes a person human.. empathy. Why should we have empathy for a man who had zero of it? How are people excusing what #erykahbadu said? She's not deep, she's crazy.
— Lauren Laughland (@laurlaughland) January 24, 2018
From USA Today, Story by Maria Puente.
Badu, 46, went off on a convoluted explanation of her views, which suggested that since Hitler supposedly had a terrible childhood, she could empathize with an abused child. “I guess it’s just the Pisces in me,” she said.
Marchese said “going down the route of ‘Hitler was a child once, too’ is maybe turning the idea of empathy into an empty abstraction.”
“Maybe so,” Badu said. “It doesn’t test my limits — I can see this clearly. I don’t care if the whole group says something, I’m going to be honest. I know I don’t have the most popular opinion sometimes.”
No, indeed, as the reaction on Twitter suggested.
Badu responded later with a series of tweets, in which she declared, “Say what u must. Dialogue is cool.”
Say what u must. Dialogue is cool . I invite it. But please do me a favor if you can , Black & Jewish Twitter, just don't use the word "problematic " any more. 😂Y'all using that too much . 🙄.. oh and read the article.
— ErykahBadoula (@fatbellybella) January 24, 2018
But before that, the pushback ranged from polite to profane to incredulous.
“To Holocaust survivors and their ancestors, it’s a kick in the teeth and an unnecessarily offensive thing to say,” tweeted Joshua Zitser.
Erykah Badu, when you say you can see good in Hitler, just remember something… in your mind, that might seem like a real smart and nuanced point. To Holocaust survivors and their ancestors, it’s a kick in the teeth and an unnecessarily offensive thing to say.
— Joshua Zitser (@mrjoshz) January 24, 2018
“Erykah Badu, nooooooo! (Erykah and I went to college together, and I’m just floored by this interview),” tweeted Charles M. Blow, the New York Times’ politics-and-social-justice opinion columnist.
Erykah Badu, nooooooo! (Erykah and I went to college together, and I’m just floored by this interview) https://t.co/5ndjVDyHiN pic.twitter.com/G7Xyh93ms9
— Charles M. Blow (@CharlesMBlow) January 24, 2018
this is…
kinda nuts… i don't…know what to do or say about erykah anymore…https://t.co/j4J4PDQzYz
— Xavier D'Leau (@XavierDLeau) January 24, 2018
Some people couldn’t decide how to respond. “I don’t know what to do or say about erykah anymore,” said Xavier D’Leau.
this is…
kinda nuts… i don't…know what to do or say about erykah anymore…https://t.co/j4J4PDQzYz
— Xavier D'Leau (@XavierDLeau) January 24, 2018
Badu also had some sympathetic words for Bill Cosby, and nevermind the dozens of allegations that he drugged and/or raped women going back to the mid-1960s.
“I love Bill Cosby,” she said. “I love what he’s done for the world. But if he’s sick, why would I be angry with him? The people who got hurt, I feel so bad for them. I want them to feel better, too. But sick people do evil things; hurt people hurt people. I know I could be crucified for saying that…”
Cue the mouths dropping open.
“This is a fascinating, infuriating interview where Erykah Badu talks about seeing the humanity in Bill Cosby and…Hitler (my jaw is currently on the floor),” tweeted Ashley Weatherford, a beauty editor for The Cut, New York magazine’s style column.
This is a fascinating, infuriating interview where Erykah Badu talks about seeing the humanity in Bill Cosby and…Hitler (my jaw is currently on the floor) https://t.co/Tgz54qgjqk
— Ashley Weatherford (@sincerelyash) January 24, 2018
Badu, famous for her eccentric hats and headgear, has long been known to operate on her own wavelength.
She said her way of thinking might stem from her astrological sign, Pisces, and “a cognitive-dissonance reality” we all live in, plus the “hive mentality.”
“We want to live a certain way or do a certain thing, and we don’t because we are emotionally attached to how the group thinks,” she said. “The hive mentality takes over. But you know what’s right in your mind and your heart, and if you’re strong enough to detach from the hive then sometimes, just sometimes, you may be able to do the right thing.”
Marchese moved on with the interview, apparently arranged in connection with the reissue of her debut album, 1997’s Baduizm, tentatively slated for return as a set of vinyl 45s in February.
“Why why why did I click to see why Erykah Badu was trending???” tweet-moaned MSNBC’s Joy Reid.
https://twitter.com/JoyAnnReid/status/956214270240403458
Read more at USA Today,
