Pepsi Company has cut ties with Lil Wayne one of the biggest stars in pop music, over the rapper’s crude lyrical reference to civil rights martyr Emmett Till. The tattoo loving singer had a deal to promote the company’s Mountain Dew soda. On Friday, PepsiCo said in a statement that Wayne’s “offensive reference to a revered civil rights icon does not reflect the values of our brand.” It declined to provide any further comment.


A publicist for Lil Wayne, Sarah Cunningham, said that the split was due to “creative differences” and that it was an amicable parting. “That’s about all I can tell you at this time,” she said.

Wayne had sent the Till family a letter offering empathy and saying that he would not reference Till or the family in his music, particularly in an inappropriate manner, but the Till family said the letter fell short of an apology. “It’s mindboggling to me that they partnered with him in the first place,” said the Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., a Till cousin and witness to his abduction. “Major corporations should scrutinize who they endorse, don’t let greed or money determine who you sponsor.” Parker’s written statement said Wayne’s lyrics not only insulted Till’s memory but degraded women as well.

Rev. Al Sharpton, who had been working with the Till family to arrange a meeting with Lil Wayne and PepsiCo officials, said that he hopes the decision ultimately is less about punishing individual rappers and more a cultural “teaching moment.” “Otherwise we’re just waiting on the next train crash instead of trying to really resolve our problem and learn from these experiences and set a tone in the country that’s healthy for everybody,” he said.

The controversy erupted after Wayne made the reference to Till on Future’s song “Karate Chop” earlier this year. He refers to a violent sexual act on a woman and says he wants to do as much damage as was done to Till.

The black teen from Chicago was in Mississippi visiting family in 1955 when he was killed, allegedly for whistling at a white woman. He was beaten, had his eyes gouged out and was shot in the head before his assailants tied a cotton gin fan to his body with barbed wire and tossed it into a river. Two white men, including the woman’s husband, were acquitted by an all-white jury. Till’s body was recovered and returned to Chicago where his mother, Mamie Till, insisted on having an open casket at his funeral. The pictures of his battered body helped push civil rights into the cultural conversation.