Black community in Washington, D.C. in August.
Credit: Freddie Allen/NNPA
WASHINGTON (NNPA) – In the wake of the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed Black teenager in Ferguson, Mo., members of the Black community and independent artists continue to call on mainstream rappers and entertainers to use their visibility to speak out against police brutality affecting young, Black males.
Jasiri X, an internationally-known rapper, six-time Pittsburgh Hip-Hop Award winner, and community activist, said that the Black community should not only expect mainstream artists to get involved, but that Blacks should also put pressure on them to get involved.
“Most of these artists are young, Black men and they have probably experienced the same racism and police brutality themselves. So when we see something happen to somebody that is basically their peer, we should expect them to say something and get involved,” said Jasiri X, who also co-founded the 1Hood Media Academy, a program that teaches young, Black boys how to analyze and create media.
Even though the primary consumers of mainstream rap music are White males, Jasiri X said that artists still have to maintain ties to the Black community to stay relevant.
Jasiri X continued: “It’s young brothers like Michael Brown, like Trayvon Martin, like Jordan Davis that make them hot. You gotta come to the ‘hood for swag.”
Jasiri X said that, “Next time they tweet about their album or single coming out or a big deal they did with some corporation, we should ask them, ‘Well, why didn’t you tweet about this situation? Why didn’t you tweet ‘Justice for Michael Brown?’”
Kenneth “Mo Skillz” Jones, a producer, songwriter and motivational speaker from East St. Louis, Ill., released a music video in September in an effort to raise awareness about police brutality and to encourage people to register to vote. The video depicts images of police using excessive force, including footage of a police officer toppling a man sitting in a wheelchair and dragging another man who was handcuffed by his feet. A video clip of Eric Garner on the ground gasping for breath as a Staten Island, N.Y., police officer chokes him to death is also featured. Earlier versions of the Skillz music video were also published to YouTube in August.
Jasiri X said, “I look at someone like Jamie Foxx. Jamie Foxx stood with Trayvon’s family, he wore Trayvon’s shirt, he’s still in [‘The Amazing Spiderman 2’], he’s still in ‘Annie,’ he’s still an A-list actor and celebrity. I mean what are you afraid of?”
Jasiri X also noted that Jay-Z spoke about overcrowded prisons during a concert in California.
Jineea Butler, the founder of the Social Services of Hip Hop and the Hip Hop Union, a collective of nearly two dozen hip-hop organizations dedicated to promoting civil rights and economic empowerment, said that the hip-hop community hasn’t done enough in Ferguson, Mo., following the shooting death of Brown.
Butler said that because of how rappers today are handpicked to say nothing and do nothing, we can’t really depend on them to do too much, because they don’t understand the civil rights movement.
Jasiri X said that rap music wasn’t more militant in the early 90s, corporations just hadn’t figured out how to monetize it yet.
When major record labels started pouring millions of dollars into the nascent genre, label executives started pushing certain images of Black men in favor of others, bisecting the genre into underground and mainstream, Jasiri X explained.
Butler said that even positive songs from mainstream artists often have a hard time breaking through.
“We’ve been focused on things that don’t matter,” said Skillz. “We need to get more involved in what’s really going on in our communities, more than what we’ve done up until this point. I think its happening. You see a lot more youth a lot and more college students being involved in these protests.”
Butler said that Hip-Hop is definitely a part of the new civil rights movement and should play a major role in how Blacks affect change in their communities.
She added: “What everybody needs to know is that hip hop has the power, but it’s about who is going to lead and in which direction.”
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By Freddie Allen
NNPA Washington correspondent