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Kanye West, now known as Ye, is one of the best-selling musical artists in the world. He's also in recent years becoming a celebrated and very highly-paid fashion designer. And of course, for a decade, he was well known to TV audiences as an in-law of the Kardashian family.

But it's West's latest incarnation as a kind of Christian evangelist that brought us to his office in Los Angeles today for the interview you're about to see. Days ago, during Fashion Week in Paris, West, accompanied by his friend Candace Owens, unveiled a T-shirt that read simply "White Lives Matter." The response from the fashion industry and international media was instantaneous and uniform – shock, horror, rage.  

KANYE WEST DOUBLES DOWN AMID 'WHITE LIVES MATTER' CLOTHING BACKLASH: 'THEY DO' 

Kanye West

Kanye West attends the WSJ. Magazine 2019 Innovator Awards at the Museum of Modern Art on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2019, in New York.  (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

There is no excuse for this, thundered the New York Times. West is legitimizing extremism, shrieked Rolling Stone, etc., etc.. What was strikingly missing from the coverage, however, was any explanation for why West did this. What was the t-shirt about? No one seemed to think to ask him, much less to listen to what he had to say. Instead, the enemies of his ideas dismissed West as they have for years – as mentally ill, too crazy to take seriously. Look away. Ignore him. He's a mental patient. There's nothing to see here.

But is West crazy? You can judge for yourself as you watch what we're about to show you.  

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He has his own ideas. We can say that. Creative people tend to. That's why they're artists, not actuaries. His free-form social media post gives the impression of a man channeling his rawest emotions right onto Instagram. The effect can be jarring and it's often used as ammunition against him in the battle for influence over the minds of America's young people and that battle is intense. 

But crazy? That was not our conclusion. In fact, we've rarely heard a man speak so honestly and so movingly about what he believes. But again, you can judge for yourself.