Erykah Badu took two days to clear up her comments.(Photo by Leon Bennett/Getty Images for Essence)
Erykah Badu is well aware of the criticism hurled at her for comments she made about Nazi Germany leader Adolf Hitler’s painting skills. The singer explained in a wide-ranging interview with Vulture published Wednesday, Jan. 24 that she sees the good in everyone.
“I’m not an anti-Semitic person,” she said, addressing her previous defense of Nation of Islam founder Louis Farrakhan, an alleged anti-Semite. “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.
“Hitler was a wonderful painter,” she added before explaining further.
“Okay, he was a terrible painter. Poor thing. He had a terrible childhood,” she said. “That means that when I’m looking at my daughter, Mars, I could imagine her being in someone else’s home and being treated so poorly, and what that could spawn. I see things like that. I guess it’s just the Pisces in me.”
The comments people latched onto, however, were those about Hitler, whose fascist policies spurred World War II and the genocide of millions of Jewish people.
“Ignorant and crystal deodorant Twitter is defending Erykah Badu,” one person said. “But I refuse to, not today.”
“Why do we have to keep saying this,” another wondered. “THERE WAS NO GOOD IN HITLER. He was responsible for the systematized murder of over twelve million people.”
But Badu cleared things up in a series of tweets Wednesday and Thursday. She initially blamed click bait and then said she “used 1 of the worst examples possible, not to support the cruel actions of an unwell, psychopathic Adolf Hitler, but to only exaggerate a show of compassion.”
Badu also hoped people would read the entire article rather than taking headline-making quotes and running with them.
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
The media is banking on our ignorance. Know we won't read the whole thing. They'll use controversial quotes w/trigger words as Click Bait. We❤️controversy. So Blogs choose easiest thing to "spin". Get you mad. Help you get a little rage out. They get more adds.The message lost.
— ErykahBadoula (@fatbellybella) January 24, 2018
People are in real pain. So I understand why my 'good' intent was misconstrued as 'bad'. In trying to express a point, I used 1 of the worst examples possible, Not to support the cruel actions of an unwell, psychopathic Adolf Hitler, but to only exaggerate a show of compassion.
— ErykahBadoula (@fatbellybella) January 25, 2018
Either U read the entire VULTURE interview & U understood the message of compassion CLEARLY.
OR U only read the selective, out of context Headlines, & were drawn in2 the whirlpool of collective emotional grief. I don't want 2 force U 2understand the way I love. I'm hopeful tho.— ErykahBadoula (@fatbellybella) January 25, 2018
