Kevin Gates Reveals He Was Molested As a Child

On a Hotboxin’ podcast episode with Mike Tyson, Kevin Gates opens up about how his traumatic past led him to become a rapper. Rapping being his “escape.”

A few minutes into the episode Kevin Gates was asked what led him on to pursue a rap career. He then shared that as a child he was molested and rapping became an escape for him.

He says, “I grew up real, real violent, and real aggressive. Not because I wanted to be, but because I was molested when I was a child.”

He continued on to share that he became very active when he was younger. In order to no longer feel vulnerable he began to take martial arts as well as find ways to act and be tough. All in order to avoid vulnerability.

He also began to discover that writing and making music became the “out” for him.

He goes on to say that he became “mean” and “tough” because he no longer wanted to be bullied.

But as he continued on with his “tough guy mean” image he has also stated,

“But the reason I speak about it now is because I just released a mixtape, like maybe a few months ago, and guys walk up to me in the gym. Like, bodybuilders, hugged me and crying like, ‘I went through the same shit you went through.’ … So, I guess I’m on the right path. … But at the end of the day, I started, we started killing and things of that nature because we had a fear of being vulnerable.”

After this moment of sharing, the podcast continues on to talk about Kevin Gates and his religion, family, and relationships.

You can watch and listen to the whole episode here.