Kyrie Irving’s full explanation for why he promoted an antisemitic film

Kyrie Irving addressed his Twitter controversy on Saturday night and clashed with reporters over their questioning.

Kyrie Irving took questions from the media on Saturday night for the first time since he became involved in another off-court controversy, after sharing a link on Twitter to an antisemitic film, “Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America.”

Nets governor Joe Tsai publicly rebuked Irving on Twitter on Friday over the post, writing that “this is hurtful to all of us, and as a man of faith, it is wrong to promote hate based on race, ethnicity or religion.” The NBA issued its own statement, which did not explicitly mention Irving, on Saturday.

When asked about his tweet, Irving initially called for clarification as to what backlash was even being referenced, but then gave a full rundown of what led to his decision to share the link.

In a long and confusing statement that calls into question whether Irving watched the film before sharing it, the Nets star explains that he was researching the meaning of his first name – a journey that led him to a highly controversial film.

“I was on Amazon Prime and I’m sitting there on my phone at the same time – and I’ll do those things. Like I’ll watch a documentary, I’ll watch a program or show that’s education-first, that either talks about history or finance. Talks about the state of the world. I’m all over the place when it comes to, you know, really elevating my consciousness, because I didn’t get it in school. All I did was get seven hours a day of being indoctrinated and brainwashed on history that doesn’t belong to me or my ancestors.

So, that day particularly, I went home and I was on Google. Of course people love that search engine, but I wasn’t looking for any antisemitic stuff, or any thing specifically going at any other race of people. I looked up my name and what it means, and it’s a title given to Christ. Philippians 2:11. And my name translates into Hebrew language as Yahweh.

So I went on to Amazon Prime, and I was like ‘you know what? Let me see if there are any documentaries on Yahweh.’ So, went in the search bar, typed in ‘Yahweh,’ that came up. Went out, shared it on my platform… that was my night.

In terms of the backlash or what people call it – we’re in 2022. History is not supposed to be hidden from anybody. And I’m not a divisive person when it comes to religion. I embrace all walks of life, you see it on all my platforms. I talk to all races, all cultures, all religions. And my response would be it’s not about educating yourself about what Semitism is, what antisemitism is. It’s really about learning the root words of where these come from, and understanding that this is an African heritage that is also belonging to people. Africa is in it, whether we want to dismiss it or not.

So, the claims of antisemitism and ‘who are the original chosen people of God,’ and we go into these religious conversations and it’s a big no-no. I don’t live my way like that. I don’t live my life that way.”

Irving was also asked about sharing an Alex Jones video earlier this month. After saying he does not support Jones, Irving upheld that the content of the video was true. Irving then argued with ESPN’s Nick Friedell that he was not promoting the film by tweeting a link to its Amazon page, and accused Friedell of “dehumanizing” him.

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