Fact Check: Are the pictures of a ripped Kanye West working out real? Viral post debunked

Recently, a series of photos of Kanye West surfaced on Facebook that showed the rapper with a ripped physique. The post, shared by the Facebook handle Beautylicious, came with a caption that read:

"Kanye is becoming the best version of himself."

In some of the photos, West could be seen working out in the gym, jogging. In another one, Ye was shown eating healthy food. While a few people believed for once that the photos were real, many clarified that they weren't. The photos are in fact AI-generated and thus aren't real.

One netizen named Michael Evans took to the Facebook comment box under the post and referred to Ye's mental state. The user wrote,

"Hopefully he can work on his mental health also."

Another user named Tristian Burns was one of the many who clarified that the photos were fake. The netizen wrote,

"Seeing these ai pics of him should really motivate him to look like these, should be his goals."

Several discrepancies could be seen in the photos. In one photo, Ye's fingers and shoelaces looked distorted. In another one, his chest tattoos were missing, while another one had them. Thus, it is clear that the photos aren't real. These photos further went viral amid the drama related to the rumors that Kanye West had been consuming nitrous oxide, as alleged by his former chief-of-staff, Milo Yiannopoulos.

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From nitrous oxide to alcohol, Kanye West has been courting controversy for the last couple of years

Kanye West had been recently in the headlines after his former chief of staff, Milo Yiannopoulos, accused his dentist, Thomas Connelly, and current chief of staff, Eric J Cui, of getting him hooked on nitrous oxide, aka laughing gas. Meanwhile, a series of tweets under the "SaveYe" tag had also become trending after concerned fans took to X to extend support to the rapper.

This wasn't the first time that Kanye found himself in the middle of controversy. Back in 2022, he was allegedly involved in a health crisis situation. In an interview from that time on the Candace podcast, he told host Candace Owens about his addiction to alcohol. He claimed that he was intoxicated when he posted some anti-Semitic tweets.

He told Candace,

"I was drinking when I put up the DEFCON tweet... You wanna know what alcohol I had inside me? Hennessy. It turns us gray. The demons [come out]."

One of the most talked-about controversial tweets made by Ye back then read,

"I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up I’m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE."

The comments proved quite harmful for his career. Ye ended up losing Yeezy's partnership with Adidas, who stated that they found the remarks made by the rapper "unacceptable, hateful, and dangerous." In December 2023, Kanye apologized to the Jewish community for his insensitive comments.

The remarks, which reportedly began with his addiction problems, didn't end with the apology. Earlier this year, former Yeezy employee Trevor Phillips filed a suit against him, in which he claimed that the work environment was quite hostile in the company and that discrimination prevailed.

In February, he also claimed getting sued by Adidas for allegedly selling "fake" versions of his footwear. Thus, it could safely be concluded that the rapper had been in the middle of some issue and controversy for quite some time now.