Kanye West wore a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt Monday during Paris Fashion Week’s Yeezy runway show. And so did his conservative-pundit pal Candace Owens.

Ye’s long-sleeved black T-shirt with bold white writing on the back served one purpose immediately: getting outlets to write about Ye’s presentation. But when Owens’ long-sleeved white version joined the mix, with the same message rendered in black type, the story got more complex.

Each shirt bore the image of a pope. Owens’ had Pope John Paul I, whose 33-day tenure at the Vatican was among history’s shortest, while Ye’s showed Pope John Paul II, the long-tenured pontiff who died in 2005 and was canonized as a saint in 2014.

Both shirts had the words “Juan Pablo” at the bottom — Ye’s had a “II” as well — and up top, the Spanish words “Seguiremos Tu Ejemplo”: “We will follow your example.”

And people on social media Had Thoughts, from tweets about how the duo was “living rent free in a bunch of Leftist heads right now” to remarks about how they were “standing in solidarity for ignorance” and “You don’t have to be white to uphold white supremacy and anti-Blackness.” On Twitter, there were many more comments in line with the latter comments than the first one, with the ratio running in the other direction on Truth Social.

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