With a performance in Amsterdam slated for tonight, a number of gay rights activists have protested underground Hip Hop heavyweights Jedi Mind Tricks. After scrutinizing the groups’s lyrics – with some which contain anti-gay lyrics – the gay rights activist group Centre for Culture and Leisure (also called the C.O.C.) has organized a massive protest against the Philadelphia group’s performance.
“In a city like Amsterdam, where we are cracking down on discrimination and homophobia, a statement must be made against this kind of music,” said the C.O.C.’s Amsterdam branch. “The so-called apologies made on Wednesday are the band’s apologies to the Melkweg for the commotion they caused. It was neither a gesture of goodwill towards the city of Amsterdam, nor to its many LGBT citizens.”
The managers of the Amsterdam club De Melkweg have refused to cancel JMT’s performance. They argue in favor of the group’s right to free speech, and say that the group haven’t performed a number of the songs with anti-homosexual lyrics in question in many years.
“Another consideration is that some lyrics date from their early days and have not been sung by the band for years,” said representatives from De Melkweg.
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Most recently in a guest verse on Celph-Titled & Buckwild‘s “Eraserhead” Vinnie said, “you phoney motherfuckers never held a ratchet ever/you was in the fag bar with Kanye, strapped in leather.” The lines would come to no surprise to anyone who caught Jedi Mind Tricks at the 2007 Rock The Bells in San Francisco where Vinnie Paz went on an impromptu “faggot” laced tirade towards Kanye between songs.
Jedi Mind Tricks is currently preparing their seventh album Violence Begets Violence, due in stores 2011 on Enemy Soil Records.
