After Kanye West’s recent outpouring of support on Twitter for Donald Trump and his claim that slavery was “a choice,” the backlash for the 40-year-old controversial rapper continues.
During a live interview in TMZ’s newsroom on Tuesday, May 1, West revealed that he was addicted to opioids after undergoing liposuction.
“Two days before I was in the hospital I was on opioids,” West said. “I was addicted to opioids. I had plastic surgery because I was trying to look good for y’all. I got liposuction because I didn’t want y’all to call me fat like y’all called Rob [Kardashian] at the wedding and made him fly home before me and Kim got married.”
The revelation was shocking, considering West’s mother, Donda, died in 2007 from complications of a liposuction and breast-reduction surgery. The hospital stay West referred to during the rant-filled TMZ interview was in 2016, when he was admitted for “exhaustion” and placed on psychiatric hold after abruptly canceling his Saint Pablo Tour.
“I was taking two pills a day at that time,” he said. “When I left the hospital, how many pills do you think I was given? Seven. I went from taking two pills to taking seven.”
But the expletive-laden tirade didn’t stop there for West, who is set to release his eighth studio album on June 1.
“The reason why I dropped those tweets and everything is because I was drugged the f*** out bro, and I’m not drugged out,” said West. “These pills that they want me to take three of a day, I take one a week—maybe two a week. Y’all had me scared of myself, of my vision, so I took some pills so I wouldn’t go the hospital and prove everyone right. We are drugged out. We are following other people’s opinions. We are controlled by the media and today it all changes.”
Though West has yet to expound on his surgery and battles with opioid addiction, he did attempt to clarify his stance on slavery, which sparked the trending hashtag #IfSlaveryWereAChoice, on Twitter.
“To make myself clear, of course I know that slaves did not get shackled and put on a boat by free will,” he tweeted.
