„People tell me take it to my grave, truth will set you free someday.“
By Regina Cho
Associate News Editor
Ye has made countless shocking revelations via his X account over the last few months, with each new round of posts more unpredictable than the last. Most recently, the Chicago rapper shared the backstory of a new snippet he released named “Cousins,” which is about the alleged incestuous relationship he had with his male cousin when he was younger.
He began by telling his followers his cousin is currently behind bars for murder and that they used to look at print media together that was not age appropriate at the time. “This song is called COUSINS about my cousin that’s locked in jail for life for killing a pregnant lady a few years after I told him we wouldn’t ‘look at dirty magazines together’ anymore,” he typed.
The father of four then reflected about how he once thought he was responsible for the way things panned out, adding, “Perhaps in my self centered mess I felt it was my fault that I showed him those dirty magazines when he was 6 and then we acted out what we saw.”
“My dad had playboy magazines but the magazines I found in the top of my moms closet were different,” the post went on. He concluded by making sure readers weren’t going to misinterpret his words by writing a straightforward statement: “My name is Ye and I sucked my cousins d*ck till I was 14.”
On the track itself, West’s lyrics reflect the story he told in his X post as he sings over a warpy guitar-led beat, “Hanging with my cousin reading dirty magazines/ We seen some n**as kiss, and we ain’t know what that s**t mean/ Then we start reenacting everything that we had seen/ That’s when I gave my cousin head.”
He also sings that he vowed to never tell anyone what happened, adding, “People tell me take it to my grave/ ‘Truth will set you free someday’/ I don’t think they understand that I’m not attracted to a man.” Listen to the snippet here.
A majority of the Graduation creator’s followers were shocked about the personal anecdote, and some people empathized with his ability to share his truth. “Idk how anyone could laugh at this. This is childhood trauma not to be taken lightly. I love you dude and I appreciate your vulnerability always,” one fan replied.
Another person urged people to see this as a marketing tactic, writing, “You need to understand how Kanye works and his marketing genius. I’m not discounting the trauma of this but he uses shock to drive his marketing campaigns.”
Although Ye has teased and released new music throughout 2025, such as his unconventionally released Bully album and his snippet named after Hitler, his last full-length project available on streaming services is 2024’s Vultures 2. The joint body of work with Ty Dolla $ign is 16 tracks long and features assists from Playboi Carti, Don Toliver, Lil Durk, Kodak Black, and plenty more.
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