Accomplished rapper, producer, fashion designer and not-so-accomplished presidential candidate Kanye West has continued his Instagram war with Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson after claiming he caused Pete to delete his Instagram page.
Kanye posted a screenshot of Pete’s deleted Instagram page with the caption, “Ran Skete off the gram. Tell your mother I changed your name for life.” Kanye also posted a screenshot from BuzzFeed claiming that Davidson deleted his Instagram because his comments were flooded with Kanye fans calling him “Skete,” a not-so-affectionate nickname Kanye gave Pete.
Kanye has uploaded and deleted multiple Instagram posts harassing Pete and his ex-wife Kim in the last two weeks. Kanye even encouraged his fans to scream at Davidson if they see him in public.
Kanye also posted private text messages from Kim. In the messages, Kim said that Kanye was creating a “dangerous and scary environment” and that “someone will hurt Pete and it will be all your fault.” In the caption, Kanye referred to Kim as his wife and told his fans not to do anything physical to Davidson because he was “GOING TO HANDLE THE SITUATION MYSELF.”
Kanye’s online harassment led some people to be concerned for Kim’s physical and mental wellbeing. Some women even gave examples of how they have experienced similar behavior from men before.
But despite the concern from some women, if you looked under the replies to Kanye’s posts, you would see thousands of commenters showing their support. Comments that said “KIMYE FOREVER” or encouraged him to “fight for his family” had upwards of 10,000 likes. Most of these comments came from men.
All of Kanye’s posts and the support he received point out a larger problem: men do not know how to handle rejection properly.
Countless romantic comedies feature a story where a man is rejected but convinces the woman to change her mind through persistence and romantic gestures. However, harassing someone until they relent should not be seen as romantic.
Not being able to handle rejection can have dangerous consequences. Rejection violence is a valid and dangerous concern that many women deal with. A quick Google search can bring up numerous examples of rejection violence.
An Eastern Kentucky University study tested the connection between toxic masculinity and rejection violence and found over 50 cases of violence against women that had no ulterior motives outside of rejection of a sexual advance.
When you are rejected, you should respect the other person’s decision and move on. Harassing someone uninterested in you should never be the solution to rejection. They could have a wide range of reasons to reject you: they could be busy at a new job, they could be dealing with the death of a family member or they could simply not like you. All are valid reasons.
Your job as the rejected is to accept the rejection and move on. As romantic as sending someone a truckload of roses may sound, it’s just creepy if the feelings are unreciprocated.