Kip Moore Speaks Out After Charlottesville Marches: ‘We All Bleed the Same’
Following Friday (Aug. 11) and Saturday (Aug. 12)'s rallies of white supremacists, white nationalists, Ku Klux Klan members and neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, Va., and the counter-protests nearby, Kip Moore shared a lengthy Instagram post urging his fans and followers to spread kindness and take care of each other. In the same post, the singer shared his thoughts on growing up in Georgia and seeing racism spread.
Moore's Instagram post expands on a succinct tweet he shared on Sunday: "If your parents taught u 2 hate people of color they're idiots. If you're an adult & still spewing their hate, that makes u a bigger idiot." A native of Georgia, Moore says that he learned early on "what racism looks like, sounds like, and what it feels like (when you hear it out of another's mouth)." He talks about cutting friends out of his life after hearing them use the N-word and other racist rhetoric.
"I was lucky to have parents that never instilled that toxic hatred in my bloodline," Moore says. "The one constant theme I learned at a young age was, they all developed those ignorant views from their ignorant parents who learned it from their ignorant parents."
It's one thing to agree with Moore's thoughts, he says, but it's another to act on those feelings: "Don't b---h about the state of the world if you're too lazy or too much of a puss to stand up to your friends when you hear them or see them doing racist s--t," Moore writes.
"It starts with each one of us individually if we wanna change what this world looks like," Moore says. "Go out of your way to take care of people and spread kindness ... I'm saddened anytime I see hatred towards one another, and you should be ashamed if you don't feel the same way. It's never too late to evaluate who you are and break the chain that's been passed down. We all bleed the same."
This Instagram post is not the only time Moore has expressed his feelings about racism and hate: In the summer of 2016, around the time that two Black men, Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, were killed by police in Louisiana and Minnesota, respectively, Moore used a video to call on his fans to “be the change” and put an end to the violence and racism plaguing the U.S.
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