The Game collaborated with the artist formerly known as Kanye West again on his new album The Documentary III, and he directly references the rapper’s embrace of anti-semitism on the song.
On “40 Nights,” one of two tracks with a credited feature from Ye on the record, Game raps about Ye’s widely criticized comments in his second verse while Ye handles the chorus and the third verse.
“Last year, Ye said we made at the Jews/I said, ‘What that mean? We ain’t gettin’ no more shoes?” The Game raps, a seeming nod to adidas’ termination of their deal with West in 2022. He continues: “Drake half-Jewish, I like the Jews/Not all of ‘em, but most of them cool/And sometimes, I feel the same way about my own race/‘Til I start starin’ at my own face.”
“Half-Jewish” is a formulation that has its own problematic history. The concept of labeling people as half- or quarter-Jewish came from the Nazis, though the concept of being “half-Jewish” has since been adopted by some people of Jewish heritage themselves, usually to refer to someone whose father is Jewish while their mother is not. Drake, of course, has the opposite situation.
Meanwhile, in Ye’s chorus, he raps, “I tweeted the rage/And still sold eighty-thousand seats to the stage.”
In 2022, Ye lost what goodwill he had left when he threatened to go "death con 3 on Jewish people." He later sat down for a Hitler-praising interview with conspiracy theorist Alex Jones for InfoWars, which has since been taken over by the satirical publication The Onion. Earlier this year, Ye apologized in a full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal.
"One of the difficult aspects of having bipolar type-1 are the disconnected moments—many of which I still cannot recall—that lead to poor judgment and reckless behavior that oftentimes feels like an out-of-body experience," he wrote. "I regret and am deeply mortified by my actions in that state, and am committed to accountability, treatment, and meaningful change. It does not excuse what I did, though. I am not a Nazi or an antisemite. I love Jewish people."
Elsewhere on the album, The Game made it clear that he sides with Drake and not Kendrick Lamar in their feud.
“I ain’t got no problem with the boogeyman/And he ain’t got a problem with me 'cause I’m the LA monster," Game raps on the chorus of “LA Monster,” seemingly referencing Kendrick Lamar dubbing himself the "certified boogeyman" on his chart-topping Drake diss, "Not Like Us." "You can ask the boy who the man is/Shit get scandalous, he know I’m the LA monster/I might drive the Rolls today/The GNX scare the hoes away ‘cause it’s an LA monster."
