Still newlywed, Kanye West insists he's learned to bite his tongue at times out of respect for wife Kim Kardashian and his young daughter.

Appearing on an episode of the Ellen DeGeneres show during which she showed off her rapping chops, the long outspoken and sometimes bombastic West assured the host, "I've definitely learned how to compromise more. Which is something you have to understand when you partner with people in business. Yeah, I think I'm a better human being because of her, and because of my daughter."

Still, the 37-year-old West took the time to defend some of his former actions as a case of simply defending the things he believes in and the honor of being true to himself.

"You know, something for me to be brave for what I want to do for humanity," he said. "There are things I've done in the past that were considered negative, but I was really jumping in front of the tank for other people or for culture in a way, so now I always have to have that in my mind that I have a family that I have to protect too."

As for such public declarations as Taylor Swift was not fully deserving of her 2009 VMA Award and that "George Bush doesn't care about black people" based on the way he handled the Hurricane Katrina tragedy, West compared his thought process to that of his 19-month-old daughter.

"I think I was going through my version of my terrible twos," he said. "My daughter, she wants to express herself, and she just doesn't have the words for it. And for me, there was so many things I wanted to do with film and clothing, and I just didn't have the words or the resources or the backing or the perception that I could do it being that I was a rapper."