Kanye West's 10 Most "Kanye" On-Camera Moments

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdH488RRQL8

Full disclosure: I was in the audience when Kanye delivered this epic rant at Chicago's United Center. It's not a television broadcast or an interview, but smartphones have made every moment an on-camera moment, and this particular one encapsulated several of Kanye's core beliefs. I'm not ashamed to admit that I teared up. He was that moving.

To be fair, his commentary about Michael Jordan deserving to own the Chicago Bulls was based in error. Jordan never asked for a stake in the team, and even if he had, Bulls' owner Jerry Reinsdorf would have been under no obligation to sell to him. That's just how business works, and it's hard to take Kanye seriously as an intellectual when he builds his arguments around untruths. What could have been a shocking but valid call for the NBA to switch to a Marxist economic model became just another example for Kanye's critics to illuminate when they call him stupid. At the time, I laughed this off.

But the second half of the speech contains some real nuggets of wisdom sprinkled in with Kanye's extreme self-confidence. "I am Kanye Motherfucking West," he says at 5:17 of the video, "and yes I am the scariest motherfucker on Earth. You know why? Because I can make 15,000 people raise their hands and ask them one question: do you believe in yourself?" The crowd, predictably, roared an affirmative.

Maybe the most important single quote from the rant is this: "How is humility looked at as a greater quality than confidence?" If the only answer you can generate is that confidence (read: arrogance) bothers you subjectively, you need to either make an attempt at finding an unbiased reasoning for your opinion or completely reevaluate your stance on people like Kanye West.