The Unconscious Biases That Keep Us Hating On Yeezy
At Olson Zaltman, my colleague Dominique Dove started a great Slack channel; #qotd (question of the day) was partly inspired by the New York Times article, “To Fall In Love With Anyone, Do This.” Every day, she poses thought-provoking questions that can reveal something personal and interesting about who we are and what we believe. It’s an easy, fun and effortless way to learn about and bond with colleagues, especially as telecommuting becomes the norm in consulting today.
Today’s #qotd: What artists or bands do you love — even though others hate them?
My immediate answer, no hesitation, no moment needed to pause and reflect:
Kayne West
Sure, it’s really easy to hate on Kanye. It’s a national pasttime it seems, to ridicule him, throw insults, discredit his success, roll our eyes at his oversized ego… But why is it so easy? There must be something that unites the collective hate.
Here’s what Elon Musk had to say when Kanye was on the cover of Time’s “The 100 Most Influencial People.”
“Kanye West would be the first person to tell you he belongs on this list. The dude doesn’t believe in false modesty, and he shouldn’t. Kanye’s belief in himself and his incredible tenacity — he performed his first single with his jaw wired shut — got him to where he is today.
In his debut album, over a decade ago, Kanye issued what amounted to a social critique and a call to arms (with a beat): “We rappers is role models: we rap, we don’t think.” But Kanye does think. Constantly. About everything. And he wants everybody else to do the same: to engage, question, push boundaries. Now that he’s a pop-culture juggernaut, he has the platform to achieve just that. He’s not afraid of being judged or ridiculed in the process. Kanye’s been playing the long game all along, and we’re only just beginning to see why.”
So, why the Kanye hate? Why is he so often ridiculed? Why do we hate a man that asks us to think, that pushes his own boundaries — and our own?
Sure, the internet has great think-pieces about Kanye and why he garners so much of our collective hate. What is missing from the discourse is an explanation for why there is such a collective, knee-jerk hatred for a man making hip-hop?
To figure that out, we have to reexamine our own cognitive biases and the deeper behavioral science explanations.
The human brain is capable of 10,000,000,000,000,000 process per second, which makes it far more powerful than any computer currently in existence. But that doesn’t mean our brains don’t have major limitations: memories are basically useless — plus, we’re subject to cognitive biases. Cognitive biases help our brain process immense amounts of information quickly… essentially, they’re just shortcuts. These cognitive shortcuts keep us safe, keep our brains humming along at their super efficient pace… and are rooted in the 95% of our brain that’s unconscious. Because cognitive biases are unconscious, they can be dangerous: We aren’t even aware of them, yet they impact every decision we make, every second of every day.
Saliency Bias: Our tendency to focus on the most easily recongizable features of a person.
Confirmation Bias: We selectively listen only to information that confirms our preconceptions and beliefs.
The largest salient features of Kanye are his race and profession: Black and hip-hop artist. These two frameworks guide our preconceptions and biases about him.
However, no matter how much our cognitive biases try to box him in, he breaks convention on both accounts. He doesn’t follow the typical narrative of a black hip-hop artist like Jay-Z or Biggie — a narrative that continues to only reinforce saliency and confirmation biases. He grew up middle-class, attended but eventually dropped out of art college, has promoted fairly monogamous relationships, and eventually married a fairly prominent woman with just as much power, success as himself.
In a BBC interview, he shared: “Would it have been better if I had a song that said, ‘I am a gangster’? Or if I had a song that said, ‘I am a pimp’? All those colors and patinas fit better on a person like me, right?”
The most interesting way that Kanye challenges our bias is through the use of metaphor in his verses. Kanye has a verse in “No More Parties In LA” wherein he uses Steve Jobs as a metaphor: “When I get on my Steve Jobs, somebody gon’ get fired.”
Beyonce, sharing similiar salient biases with West, and her share of critique and hate, also uses Silicon Valley metaphors on “Formation”: “I just might be a black Bill Gates in the making.”
What does this say about race and success? It says a lot, especially when you examine this infographic on Who Runs Silicon Valley:
This infographic has been haunting me. What’s missing? A lack of men (and women) of color. As we’ve known for a very long time, the invisibility of men of color in this country is problematic: “Unfortunately, there are so many African-American young men who are muted and invisible, and not given the opportunity to be seen otherwise. They’re perceived as threats.”
In an interview, Kanye shared his experience: “I look around, and I say, wait a second, there’s no one in this space that looks like me, and if they are, they’re quiet as fuck.”
Similarly, isn’t this the same tactic we require of West, to render him invisible? Voiceless? On Twitter, he “rants,” on television, he steals the spotlight — ultimately becoming just too visible for us, his ego and confidence a threat.
Because I am interested in the linguistic difference of our cognitive biases in action, I conducted a cursory content analysis on the cultural narrative of how we talk about an equally difficult man, one who Kanye mentions in the verse above, yet who is incredibly visible, even in death: Steve Jobs.
“belligerent eccentric” — “he’s not warm and fuzzy” — “prickly”
“a huge jerk” — “a mammoth personality”
“entrepreneurial fire” — “perfectionism”
“a genius but not a very nice guy”
Extending the Silicon Valley metaphor with a hard question: Why do we value and celebrate the oversized ego of men like Steve Jobs, who are “visionaries,” while criticize the very same oversized ego of Kanye West, who is “crazy?”
Is it easier for our unconscious biases to play into these cultural tropes because of race? Because of the percieved value they bring to our society?
I think the answer is yes.
Kanye also breaks the unconscious biases we often hold against him through his vulnerability. Vulnerability is scary, it requires being wholly and completely seen especially in a society that demands you to be invisible and voiceless.
In “All Day/I Feel Like That,” exhausted from screaming, West collapses on the floor. He looks directly at the viewer panting, with vulnerable and pleading eyes… holding his gaze with ours, asking for our validation:
Feeling lonely, even when you are with people, feeling blocked. Feeling blue, sad, feeling disinterested in things, feeling fearful.
Are your feelings easily hurt? Feeling that people are unfriendly, or do you feel like people dislike you?
I feel like that
I feel like that
I feel like that
I feel like that all the time
When will we accept Kanye as one of us… a similarly multidimensional, complicated, complex person that we all are? When will we, as a society, see past our biases and stop ridiculing a man who is creating his own personal art? When will we stop discrediting his success?
When we will stop doing this with Kanye — and all people of color everywhere?
Jessica Ames Kukreti is a Senior Behavioral Insight Strategist at Olson Zaltman. She is passionate about applying unconscious mind science to popular culture, trends and gender/race dynamics.
