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The great-great-niece of Harriet Tubman has had enough of people speaking on her ancestor’s name.
Over the weekend, Kanye West held a presidential campaign rally in North Charleston where he went full misogynoir in the middle of what appears to be a tragic mental health episode, and began to try and diminish Tubman’s legacy.
“Harriet Tubman never actually freed the slaves, she just had the slaves go work for other white people,” he said in his piece-mail tirade.
Tina Wyatt gave an interview with TMZ where she expressed that Kanye does indeed need to seek out help for his mental wellness, while also encouraging him to read a book.
“If we were left alone, we would be in an entirely different place, and what he needs to understand, if it weren’t for people like aunt Harriet, especially her, because she was selfless, she was already free,” Wyatt began.
“She didn’t have to come back. She didn’t have to risk her life. But she did it countless times. And if it hadn’t been for people like her, he would still be on that plantation. He would not be able to be out there saying the things he says, and he wouldn’t have the money he has. Because they would have it all. So when he says, that she didn’t free slaves—you know see, he doesn’t even understand who she was as a woman. I don’t even understand what he meant when he said she did what she did so they could go work for white people.”
Wyatt went into a short lesson about the end of chattel slavery and reconstruction when Black people were flourishing in avenues of business, politics and securing land and wealth. However, the confines of racism bled through, establishing the modern day systems that still haunt us today with the onslaught of Jim Crow.
“Put your money into something that would uplift other people. Him trying to run to be president is not one of them,” Wyatt concluded.
Hopefully this is the last time Wyatt has to log onto the internet to protect her great-great-aunt’s legacy.
