Update: Pusha T has responded to Drake's explanation, saying "You are silent on all black issues."
Original story below:
Pusha T did his homework when he released one of the most savage diss tracks in years, attacking Drake for everything from his father to his own rumored child with a former porn star. But possibly the most vicious blow from Pusha T's "The Story of Adidon" was the artwork that accompanied the track: a photo of a young Drake wearing blackface. Given the context, it wasn't immediately clear what the intentions were of the image, but Pusha assured that it was indeed an actual, non-doctored photo of Drake.
Rather than respond with a track to Pusha T, Drake took to his Instagram story to explain the image.
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"I know everyone is enjoying the circus but I want to clarify this image in question," Drake began in his Instagram note. "This picture is from 2007, a time in my life where I was an actor and I was working on a project that was about young black actors struggling to get roles, being stereotyped and type cast. The photos represented how African Americans were once wrongfully portrayed in entertainment."
This aligns with what the photographer David Leyes said of the photo, describing it as "a strong statement made by a black man about the fucked up culture he is living in."
Drake explained that during his years as an actor on Degrassi: The Next Generation, he and his best friend and co-star Mazin Elsadig "were attempting to use our voice to bring awareness to the issues we dealt with all the time as black actors at auditions."
"This was to highlight and raise our frustrations with not always getting a fair chance in the industry and to make a point that the struggle for black actors had not changed much," Drake wrote.
Drake has not offered any response to Pusha T's diss track beyond this explanation of the photo.
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