Chet Hanks has claimed the message of his song ‘White Boy Summer’ has been twisted by racists and bigots.
It’s been three years since Tom Hanks‘ rapper son released the track, which was a play on Megan Thee Stallion’s ‘Hot Girl Summer’ from 2019.
However, the tongue-in-cheek message of his song was soon turned into a piece of far-right rhetoric, used by the likes the Proud Boys and other extreme groups across the world.
On Tuesday (July 2), the Global Project Against Hate And Extremism shared a report about the history of “white boy summer” and how it worked its way into racist, sexist territory.
Hanks has since taken to Instagram to condemn any racist or bigoted behaviour his song has inadvertently inspired.
“White boy summer was created to be fun, playful, and a celebration of fly white boys who love beautiful queens of every race. Anything else that it has been twisted into to support any kind of hate or bigotry against any group of people is deplorable and I condemn it,” he wrote.
“I hope that we all can spread love to each other and treat each other with kindness and dignity.”
Back in May, Chet revealed that his father had asked him via text to explain the ongoing rap feud between Drake and Kendrick Lamar.
Tom Hanks messaged his son: “Big Main, can you explain the Drake/Kendrick Lamar feud to me?”. Chet then replied with a long block of text, explaining the situation to his father. Chet summarised the feud, suggesting that he thinks Kendrick Lamar came out as the victor.
The Kendrick-Drake beef has dominated the news over the last few months, being kindled by Kendrick’s contribution to ‘Like That’, from Metro Boomin and Future’s album ‘We Don’t Trust You’. On the track, Lamar responded to J. Cole and Drake’s ‘First Person Shooter’, where Cole called the trio “the big three”, by rapping: “Motherfuck the big three / N***, it’s just big me”.
That triggered a sequence of back-and-forth tracks: Drake’s ‘Push Ups’ and ‘Taylor Made Freestyle’, followed by Lamar’s ‘Euphoria’ and ‘6:16 In LA’. Drake hit back with ‘Family Matters’, which was swiftly followed by Lamar’s ‘Meet The Grahams’. The most recent contributions are Kendrick’s ‘Not Like Us’ and Drake’s ‘The Heart, Part 6’.