Elon Musk has laughed off Kanye West's assertion that he might be "half Chinese."
Since he couldn't write on Twitter, after being banned following a series of antisemitic posts, West resorted to sharing his theory on his Instagram account.
"Am I the only one who thinks Elon could be half Chinese? Have you ever seen his pics as a child?" West, now known as Ye, asked his 18.4 million followers on Sunday evening.
"Take a Chinese genius and mate them with a South African super model and we have an Elon," West wrote.
Musk's mother is Maye Musk, who was born in Canada in 1948, before moving to South Africa in 1950. Elon's father is Errol Musk, a South African electromechanical engineer who is not known to have any Chinese heritage.
West continued: "I say an Elon because they probably made 10 to 30 Elon's and he's the first genetic hybrid that stuck ..... well let's not forget about Obama."
It's not clear who West is referring to when he writes "they."
His post was brought to Musk's attention on Twitter, with the multi-billionaire brushing off the suggestion in a number of tweets.
"Lmaooo" Musk wrote after an account shared a screenshot of West's statement.
"I take that as a compliment," Musk wrote after another person brought it to his attention.
West in turn later shared a screenshot of Musk saying that he had taken the comment as a compliment.
"It was meant as a compliment my friend. Now Obama on the other hand....." Ye wrote under his latest Instagram post.
He had referenced former President Barack Obama in his initial post about Musk, suggesting he was also a "genetic hybrid."
"I'm sorry for using curse words in church but I don't have another word for Obama yet. Ye24 let's unify and find out LUAFO," West wrote.
The letters listed at the end of his Instagram post are seemingly an acronym of his campaign slogan. In his captions on the post West referred to himself as the future president of the United States.
His statement got more than 50,000 comments and he also became a trending topic on the platform he's been removed from, Twitter.
"Ye… wtf are you saying bruh," "Bro just be typing" and "this dude lost it" were some of the most liked comments on West's post.
West was banned from Twitter after he posted a series of antisemitic statements on Twitter and for comments he made in an interview on the InfoWars podcast, hosted by alt-right political figure Alex Jones.
After a spate of problematic statements from West, Musk clarified on December 2 why he was suspending West's account.
"Just clarifying that his account is being suspended for incitement to violence, not an unflattering pic of me…"
Musk added in another tweet, "he again violated our rule against incitement to violence. Account will be suspended."
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Jamie Burton is a Newsweek Senior TV and Film Reporter (Interviews) based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on ... Read more
