(AllHipHop News) Billboard recently caught up with Hip-Hop legend and political activist Chuck D. of Public Enemy/Prophets Of Rage, to get his thoughts on the growing tension between citizens and law enforcement nationwide.
On July 5 Alton Sterling was murdered by police in Baton Rouge under very questionable circumstances, followed by the controversial murder of Minnesota resident Philando Castile the next day, which was streamed in real time on Facebook Live.
This prompted some bold citizens to take matters into their own hands with retaliatory slayings of law enforcemen at a Black Lives Matter protest in Dallas, and again in Baton Rouge.
“WTF. That was my first reaction. I mean, do you have the words for things like that? I had no words [in regards to Alton Sterling]. I still have no words for it,” Chuck D. said. “And they went and covered that woman’s boyfriend Philando Castile that just got killed — I was even more silent. And then I totally had no words for what happened in Dallas…,” chimes Chuck D when asked of his initial reaction to the growing controversies.
He also had some choice words for media giants and their irresponsibility in tying Professor Griff to Dallas shooter Micah Xavier Johnson.
“We’re in the era where a picture tells you a thousand words, but now we got a thousand pictures and it doesn’t do that,” Chuck D. snapped. “You got a thousand pictures per person out there in the world. I just thought that was lazy low-fi journalism.”
According to the outspoken legend he wishes to see media improve by having the discipline to stick to the facts in their reporting regardless of the bottom line.
Chuck D. also recommended Cynthia McKinney or community organizer Rosa Clemente as presidential candidates to combat the current unrest and stated that he only views Hilary Clinton as the lesser of two evils in campaign against Trump.