Kanye West: Stealing Taylor Swift's VMA moment

Why the rapper interrupted the country singer's acceptance speech at MTV's Video Music Awards

In case you needed confirmation that Kanye West is a jerk, said Popcrunch, "feast your eyes on Exhibit A: The outspoken rapper interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech for Best Female Video at MTV’s 2009 Video Music Awards to declare that Beyonce’s popular "Single Ladies" music video" should have won instead. (watch Kanye West interrupt Taylor Swift at the VMAs) MTV should have blackballed West long ago—let's hope this latest outburst does the trick.

Give West a little credit, said Tamar Anitai in MTV.com. The rapper "slllliiiightly manned up and took to his blog—you know, instead of calling Taylor directly?—to apologize, proclaiming, 'I'm not crazy y'all. I'm just real.' Real attention-hungry?"

"No one should really be shocked," said Tom O'Neil in the Los Angeles Times, that Kanye West ruined Taylor Swift's MTV VMA victory by grabbing the mic from her and "rudely" shouting, "Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time!" This is the guy who stormed out of the 2004 American Music Awards when he didn't win "best new artist," and who interrupted another acceptance speech at the 2006 MTV Europe Music Awards to say that his video should have won—West "has a long history of throwing the best tantrums over award shows . . . of all time."

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What Kanye West took, said Hollie McKay in Fox News, the "ever-classy" Beyonce Knowles gave back. When Beyonce's hit "Single Ladies" "eventually got all it deserved by taking on the big one —Video of the Year"—she dedicated her time to Taylor Swift and "had the emotional teen idol return to the stage" to give her acceptance speech uninterrupted. West had to watch on TV because MTV bigwigs kicked him out—so in the end everybody got what they had coming.

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