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Honoree Usher accepts the Lifetime Achievement Award onstage during the 2024 BET Awards at Peacock Theater onJune 30 inLos Angeles, California.

Ushers confessions about the gratitude he feels for family, friends and fans fell victim to the mute button at the BET Awards on Sunday.

When the R&B icon received the BET Lifetime Achievement Award, he delivered a 13-minute speech that praised the people who helped him find and maintain success over the last 30 years. However, BET omitted large portions of the Confessions crooners acceptance speech, much to viewers and social media fans chagrin.

Soooooo Ushers entire speech is bleeped out, one fan tweeted Sunday evening.

Usher, who received his award from executives Babyface and L.A Reid, kicked off his speech honoring those who had been in his corner, joking about the timing of his award (Im still running and gunning) and getting vulnerable with the audience at the Peacock Theater in downtown Los Angeles about his beginnings.

Im gonna take my glasses off because I want you to see my eyes, he told his peers in attendance. I want you to understand its real.

The Grammy-winning singer talked about how his fathers absence motivated him to seriously pursue his music career and praised the father-like figures he turned to during his ascent. Then came his first censoring.

Who have spoken to me, who have been solid no matter how [expletive] may have been, he said of those father figures. Im sorry, Im cursing to let you know how I really feel.

Usher, full name Usher Raymond IV, continued his speech with a few more expletives, then BET kept the singer muted for several minutes during its broadcast, according to video shared on X (formerly Twitter.) Amid the silence and shots of attendees reacting to Ushers speech, some words would break through seemingly at random. The silent broadcast inspired memes and annoyance on X.

In a statement Monday to The Times, a BET spokesperson attributed the silence to an audio malfunction, adding that portions of Ushers speech were inadvertently muted.

The statement added that fans could watch the uninterrupted speech across BET Platforms and via Mondays encore showing of the BET Awards.

A representative for Usher did not immediately respond to The Times request for comment.

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Usher unmuted: Fans decry censorship of icon's BET Awards speech. Here's what he said - Florida Courier