Rapper Lil Nas X best known for his
song Old Town Road has collaborated
with a street wear company known as
MSCHF to release a new pair of
Nikes that Nike is not endorsing.
Nike actually has nothing to do
with it other than the fact that
their shoe is being rebranded for
the purposes of selling 666 pairs
of this mischief product.
Now, Nike is now suing the rapper
Lil Nas X for doing this.
But there's more to the story
because the right wing in all of
its culture war glory,
really the only thing that they can
latch on to has decided to focus
all of their energy on this and Dr.
Seuss, instead of the fact that
their own constituents in many
cases are worried about
losing their housing or
unable to put food on the table for
their kids, and have an incredibly
insecure economic future.
With that said, though,
let's get back to Lil Nas X and
why it is that Republicans are so
furious about this.
The controversial kicks NBC News
writes apparently modified
Nike Air Max 97s are decorated with
a pentagram pendant of a reference
to a Bible verse from Luke
about Satan's fall from heaven.
They'll be sold for $1,018.
The sneakers also contain a drop of
human blood in the soul,
which sounds fun, drawn from
members of the MSCHF team.
The company told NBC News on
Sunday and so
here's what the shoes look like.
They look fine.
I don't really care about them.
Nike is distancing itself from this
probably because they will not
be making a profit from it and
they did not endorse this or
work on this project.
And they say that they do not have
a relationship with Lil Nas X
or MSCHF.
Nike did not design or
release these shoes and
we do not endorse them.
But Conservatives like
Governor Kristi Noem who just you
know she did all her work.
She did all the work, guys.
She kicked her feet up.
She's, I'm chilling by by the pool
homeys, what can I do now?
What can I do?
I've taken care of everything.
Obviously I'm being sarcastic.
She's focused our energy on this.
And she writes, our kids are being
told that this product is,
not only okay, it's exclusive.
But do you know what's more
exclusive, their God-given
eternal soul, we are in a fight for
the soul of our nation.
We need to fight hard, we need to
fight smart, we need to win.
And then she went on with what good
will it be for someone to gain the
whole world yet forfeit their soul?
She's reading for Matthew there or
writing for Matthew.
And then we'll get
to the Kaitlin Bennett nonsense
in just a minute, but Jank I just
want people to get health care.
I want people to get health care,
I want people to have happy lives.
Republicans have no solutions.
They have nothing to offer.
So instead they're pretending to
be offended by a rapper and
the shoes that he's designed.
>> Yeah so first of all this is not
a right wing left wing issue.
In the right wing of course they
don't care about facts
at all they think Nike Is doing it.
In fact he said a thousand times
they aren't doing it they're,
we don't care.
I'm sure they're burning Nikes as
we speak, which, ironically,
was something Satan would do.
Okay, [LAUGH] I think he
burns everything
if I understand it right.
Progressives probably
not happy with the company MSCHF,
saying that they're putting their
employees blood in the shoes,
which is what they're saying.
There's human blood in the shoes,
there's a drop of blood and
they got it from their employees.
Definitely not
a progressive position, okay?
So it's not about that it's this
guy trying to get attention of
course why
because he's an entertainer and
they get paid off of attention to
the shoe sold up instantly.
Of course.
>> Mission accomplished.
>> Of course.
>> Yeah. >> Right, but
to be fair to Lil Nas X, two things
one Old Town Road is excellent,
I don't care what you say.
And [LAUGH] Number two is,
he actually has a real point here.
And I want you to hear him out.
He said, I spent my entire teenage
years hating myself because of
the crap you all preach what
happened to me because I was gay.
Okay, well now we're having a
conversation, because that's smart.
And it's true.
You're worried about a mythical
character names Beelzebub and
whatever you think, and
they look, that's the thing.
Republican politicians
don't believe it at all.
I mean, Kristi Noem has been
trending.
Kristi Noem, ironically doing
the same exact thing as Lil Nas X.
She's like, please look at me.
I want to run for president.
I'm in South Dakota.
Nobody pay attention to me.
Please, I'm
begging you look at me, right.
So, they're both playing that same
game but
in terms of the religion, but
the Republican voters do believe
it, they think Satan is real.
And so they think if you'd,
they probably think that those
shoes are possessed.
Now if you don't believe in
fundamentalist religion,
you've got your thinking no way
they don't actually believe it.
They don't think that that shoe has
anything to do with that Satan and
the shoes got together.
No I guarantee you a giant chunk of
the country thinks, no Dumbledore
and Satan are going to team up on
the shoes one's going to have
the left foot the other one's
going to have the right foot.
And this is going to be a real
problem for
our kids if they find out that
Satan's got their shoes and stuff.
To the rest of us that sounds so
insane.
We can't fathom it.
But what is real is preaching
the poison, that being gay is
somehow evil and that you're
part of Satan's plan and
that you're going to go to hell.
You put that poison into
people's heads.
You know what it does to people?
It torments them and that is real.
And that's the psychological
torture that we subject people,
the LGBTQ community to through
organized fundamentalist religion.
That's a fact.
And that does real harm.
So I think the Satan stuff is goofy
with the shoe and etc.
And I know he's trying to sell
records and shoes and stuff.
But his point about how they
tormented him for being gay and
made him hate himself.
That's a great point.
>> Well look, I like to be honest
with the audience and overall,
I don't care about any of this like
zero percent.
I don't care about the Satan shoes.
And I certainly don't care about
any bad faith argument coming from
the right wing which has found
itself in quite a conundrum because
they don't have anything to run on.
And so they have two conflicting
messages running simultaneously
right now and it
makes them look like goofy clowns.
On one hand,
you have them doing literal
hearings about cancel culture.
And he's like,
a cancel culture is so bad.
The government is banning Dr.
Seuss books, which by the way,
isn't even true.
Dr. Seuss the State decided to
discontinue publishing versions of
these Dr.
Seuss books that no one even really
knows about or cares about, right?
But it doesn't matter what
the facts of that story is.
What matters to Republicans is
okay, well, this is our message.
We're not going to offer
healthcare, we're not
going to offer any real solutions,
to jobs being shipped abroad.
We're not going to do anything for
our people at all, but what can
we do to pretend as if we're
representing their best interests?
Let's just, we're one trick ponies.
Let's go ahead and latch on to what
we've been using for decades now.
Because we have no substance and
that's cancel culture, or
more importantly,
culture war type stuff.
And that's exactly what this is.
Because what they're trying to do
here conflicts with their other
message about cancel culture.
They're trying to cancel a rapper.
What's going to happen next, okay?
Are they worried that he's a virgin
who is going to be touched for
the very first time?
This stuff happens,
it's just an endless cycle of
culture war nonsense.
I'm so sick of it.
No one cares.
You don't want your kids listening
to that music or
buying those shoes.
They are minors.
You have control over what your
kids do, okay?
Other than that just shut up and
do some legislating because that's
what you were actually hired to do
by your constituents.
And that's the other thing.
To all of the Republican voters out
there, I'm saying this honestly,
in the kindest way possible,
don't let them bamboozle you.
They're bamboozling you.
These are issues that aren't really
issues, okay?
They're manipulating you, they're
using emotional appeal to scare
you, and in the meantime, they're
passing tax cuts for the rich.
They're signing off on sweetheart
deals for their buddies.
They're pretending they love
Donald Trump when in
reality they can't stand him and
they're afraid of what might happen
to their political careers if they
speak out against him.
They don't represent anything but
more importantly,
they don't represent you,
they don't care about you.
They only care about
their political futures, which is
the reason why all you hear from
them is emotional manipulation
based on cancel culture and
culture war issues.
That's it.
>> The are two things you said and
are quite literal one is you said
they've got nothing to run on.
Yeah, without shoes of course they
got nothing to run with.
But boom, I'm here all week.
Okay, but no, seriously,
Kristi Noem the Republican governor
were telling you about.
She said, this is a quote.
I don't think there have been
better candidates to cancel
the Lil Nas X and his shoes [LAUGH]
>> I mean, you just told us for
the last couple of months that
the most important thing in
the country was cancel culture,
in which you can cancel anyone and
then they themselves turn around,
go cancel that guy.
Literally, it's just unreal, right?
And then, look for conservatism,
just say quick parent to parent pro
tip for you guys figure out how to
do parenting.
So I have my kids
with Old Town Road because it's
a fun song we love it together.
Do I am I going to have them watch
a video of the guy giving
the devil a lap dance?
No, if they stumble across it,
am I going to freak out and go,
my God Satan goodbye again.
No, I'm just going to talk to them.
Satan is a mythological character
very similar to Mephisto in
the Marvel Comic Universe, and
so it's not real, and
no don't put blood in your shoes.
He's trying to do it to get
attention, wear normal shoes and
don't believe in mythology.
There I solved it.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay, wow that was so hard.