Image Credit: Eminem: Nigel ParryIn the new issue of Spin, cover star Eminem offers his opinion on the incident at last year’s MTV Video Music Awards when Kanye West stormed the stage while Taylor Swift was accepting the award for Best Female Video.
“He shouldn’t have done that,” says the Detroit rapper, who is currently No. 1 on the Billboard album charts with his Recovery CD. “I mean, she’s a little girl.” Eminem also recalls how, during a personally bleak period a few years ago, he became jealous of Lil Wayne’s success and considered releasing a track dissing both the New Orleans rapper and West, before he thought better of it. “It would have been career suicide,” he claims.
Do you think Eminem is right to criticize West? Or do you think his words are hypocritical, given how many people he himself has attacked in rhyme over the years?
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it would be one thing if he came out and said this a year ago, but its a little late and just seems like he is piling on. move on.
Slams? Does saying that he shouldn’t have done that because she was a little girl really warrant a headline proclaiming he “slammed” West? More like he voiced a reasonable opinion on the subject when asked about what happened…
agreed!
I also agree. Plus we don’t even know what context it’s in. How did the conversation come up? Trying to start trouble are ya, Clark Collis?
exactly!!
That was my first thought. Then again, what do you expect from something like EW.
Eminem never went on stage and talked crap in front of them and a ton of people in the audience. He vented on his cds about people he was annoyed with. I never saw Eminem embarrass them when they were accepting an award in front of live tv and a huge audience.
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absolutely
Agreed, slams seems a harsh term for a pretty mild comment. Also agree he is just seeking attention, where was he last year? Eminem has a lot of talent, a shame he can’t use language that would allow us to listen to him. I understand that he makes “clean” versions of his music for his girls. Wish we could hear those versions!
Yeah, really. “Oh, take that Kanye”… Stupid Clark Collis. lol
How old were Christina and Britney when Fem dissed them? He’s a hypocrit and played out. I wish he would have said something about Wayne or Kanye because he’s right, it would have been career suicide. You don’t diss the black hand that feeds you!
Ditto!
Eminem is playing it safe. NOBODY in the R’n'B/Hip hop industry can slam Kanye. He is the best producer in the game. 50 Cent did it but now he’s looking for a hit and can keep trying.
Don’t get it twisted, it would have been career suicide at the time. Lyrically Em would kill both of them right now.
I don’t think so, if I had to put Kanye’s lyrics up against Fem’s then Kanye’s would easily win.
yeah that’s true. eminem sees it like this now because he’s a lot older now. he’s like 38 now and taylor to him is a little 19 yr-old. eminem probably wouldn’t do that to xtina or britney on the stage in the past like kanye did, though.
@ HD.. Your are either horribly mistaken or don’t know anything about rap. Eminem is able to fit 32 schemes in 16 bars.. Kanye does 16 in 16. Eminem is literally twice as good as Kanye. Kanye is a rapper/producer. I’ll give it to him that he is teh best rapper who is also a producer but cannot hold a candle to eminem. Did you even hear Forever? Eminem DESTROYED all of them. Ohh anf Em good one.. How about Kangay.. See I’m clever too..
Eminem would murder Wayne, the only reason he said it would be career suicide is because the state he was in at the time.
it’s true he picked on girls too. however, he never got up on stage and interupted them when they were accepting anything. doing that was a little much. don’t you agree?
Maybe EM is older, wiser, not as impetious as he was as a younger man. People do grow up and change.. but funny how others dont want to allow that to happen. Much less taxing on the cranium to keep everyone in their little boxes…
Huh? That’s odd since Eminem praises Kanye several times on his new album
So, you cant have a valid disagreement with someone that you consider a friend or a peer. I’m sorry.. i didnt get that memo where I am supposed to blindly follow someone who does something i disagree with… just because i admire how they do their job or a talent that they have.
i don`t get it why u guys try to squeez a big deal out of stuffs like this, for me it is just a preset game among the entertainment medias and the disputing guys, so don`t get played.
I’d hardly call that “slamming” Kanye. Wow – he said he “shouldn’t have done that”, how controversial!
Agreed, not sure who wrote the headline, but clearly Eminem wasn’t ‘slamming’ him and its a sensational attempt at getting people to read the story.
I also agree. I’d hardly call the statement quoted as ‘slamming’.
that was my first thought — where was the ‘slam’?
And furthermore, I think Kanye would agree with his statement. Not a slam at all!
Except that’s been nearly a year, and everyone (including Taylor herself) has since moved on. It would’ve been an appropriate thing to say AT THE TIME it happened, but now he’s dredging up something that’s not even worth remembering.
I dont really Em was the one dredging anything up. It was just a sad attempt at poor journalism to provoke him into saying something bad about Kanye. when he didnt they decided to try and spin the simple statement that he said into a “slam” on the rapper. In reality i think Kanye would agree with Em’s statement and i dont really think it was that much of a slam at all. Just a cheap gimmick but a desperate EW staffer to get people to read the article..and possibly cause a feud between the two rappers
he was asked about his opinion. he offered it. if anything it was the person interviewing him who dredged things up.
Agreed!
Now Eminem, how do you feel about how the government handled the Hurricane Katrina crisis in New Orleans??
He was probably asked the question point blank. That was stupid of the interviewer. Still, apparently it made headlines so maybe the people at Spin think it’s news. I also think there’s a distinction between making fun of people for entertainment and attacking a fellow artist on stage, claiming that they didn’t deserve an award.
Still, how is publicly dissing (even if it was meant humorously) two then-19-year-old pop stars in a song any less humiliating then jumping up onstage and disrupting a 19-year-old’s acceptance speech? At least Kanye didn’t say anything degrading to/about Taylor, and I’m pretty sure Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera have feelings, too. Neither of them ever saw an apology from Eminem.
Poking fun in a song is Satire, taking the mic out of somebodies hand while accepting an award is insulting. That’s the difference. Plus, eminem did admit to being ashamed of some of the “beefs” he had with the girls, Moby and the like.
eh, weird al parodies lots of things about celebrities too. he parodied michael jackson, avril lavigne – were their feelings hurt? it’s a performance. and what about comedians and comediennes who trashes other celebrities, like sarah silverman, joan rivers, etc? of course, admittedly, talking and singing trash about people is bad enough. while eminem have always maintained that “britney spears does what she does, but she can’t sing for s***”, for kanye, jumping on stage and implying taylor didn’t deserve her prize when the prize was handed out? that’s even worse.
Please, Eminem criticizing anyone on how people should be treated is like Andrew Breitbart saying he suffered as much as Shirley Sherrod.
Must politics enter into every conversation? This has nothing to do with that plus it is so last week so leave it out and move on.
Em would have crushed wayne if they beefed.
I agree. Em is a lyrical genius. His flow is amazing.
Why are we still on this? Kanye didn’t kill anyone, he just gave his opinion, granted that it was in a rude way, and Eminem should catch up with the times.
HE was not relevant at that time so no-one would care
Eminem put out an album last year… how was he not relevant then?
I haven’t received my copy of that SPIN issue in the mail yet, but I’d be willing to bet Em’s daughter Haley could be a Taylor fan, and Em is speaking more like an actual dad than a rapper in the industry, just a guess….
CMON, EW! YOU GUYS HAVE TO DO BETTER IF YOUR GONNA HEADLINE WITH THESE “FOX NEWS” ADJECTIVES LIKE “SLAM!” Im mean he states his opinon and he DID give props to Kanye several times on his album. So what if he thinks Kanye was wrong. WHO DIDNT?? And yall are late in the game rehashing this whole thing…smh
In other words THIS IS NOT NEWS!
Eminem is saying what he really thinks – which he does often and without apologies. Who actually believed that Kayne really did anyone any favors with his actions. Even this idolized Beyonce could barely hold on while she whinced at his action. Sista says life is what you make of it. Em did not diss – just stated a fact.
Yeah, if you ask anyone, even Kanye, they’ll say “he shouldn’t have done that”
Fem has some nerve given how he’s talked about both Britney & Christina who were both teens when he released tracks with disses on them. I’m over and have been for years.
Exactly… pot calling the kettle black much?
I’m tired of the Kanye v. Taylor story more than any pop-culture story in recent memory. Enough already! It was already old a week later, much less almost a year later. Taylor Swift was 19, almost 20, at the time. Hardly a “little girl”. And Kanye’s action, as rude as it was, was hardly the crime of the century it was made out to be.
“Christina Aguilera better switch me chairs, so I can sit next to Carson Daly and Fred Durst, and hear them argue over…” … you know the rest.
Christina Aguilera was just a little girl back then too!
Yeah, but with those chaps and ‘slightly’ porno-ish video, she didn’t seem so little.
Taylor was underage. This is apples and skank behavior. (Not that I disapprove, mind you, I prefer the latter myself.)
When Eminem said those things about Christina she was still doing Genie in a Bottle and What A Girl Wants. She was still fairly innocent. The chaps werent for a few more years. Agree with the other people here: he’s a bit of a hypocrite.
Taylor was 19 at the time.
Fairly innocent? Only a bit dirty then.
The Real Slim Shady was released in early 2000, which means that Christina was 19 as well, way before becoming X-tina.
Dayummmmm OMGZ what a sick burn EW! This headline is completely honest and in no way a shameless ploy to create controversy and attract pageviews, amirite?