Killer Mike appeared in a much-anticipated segment of Real Time with Bill Maher last night and kept up his streak of speaking passionately about the culture he’s identified with for much of his life.
When asked how he’d respond to people who conflate crime and violence with “Rap music,” Killer Mike joked, “You’re stupid.”
He went on to explain the development of Hip Hop as a culture and how its roots are in nonviolence and community organizing before rattling off other sources of serious violence in today’s society.
“Hip Hop, as an entity, was started in the late ’60s, early ’70s,” he said. “All these kids that were kind of the fallout kids of the Black Nationalist movement, Civil Rights, poor white people’s movement, Puerto Rican Nationalism movement — they had street gangs in New York, in the Bronx, that were just essentially burned out. At some point in the very late ’60s, early ’70s, these kids were like ‘We’re going to come up with our own peace treaty.’ They came up with their own peace treaty, decided that, ‘We aren’t going to engage in violence.’ Well, what’s the alternative to violence? The Zulu Nation was born out of that…These kids, they were children, got together in the public park, stole public electricity, which I strongly support, and decided to do park jams as an alternative to violence.”
He later added, “At our core, Hip Hop, every time you see a successful rapper, you’re seeing a job creator in the community. Jay Z has provided hundreds of jobs and created dozens of millionaires and it’s changed the economy in places it wouldn’t have. OutKast in Atlanta, personally changed the economy in the last twenty years.”
Watch the segment below:
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Much respect to killa mike for repping the culture. Health, love, awarness & wealth
Killer Mike is definatly the best spokesperson for all things hiphop related, very intelligent guy. Every time I think of that downsyndrome nigga Trinidad Lames trying to “debate” on that show I just cringe and feel embarresed, shoulda got Mike on there.
that interview made me cringe too. wish people would just let that nigg@ fade away into oblivion and stop giving him air time. We already know his music is garbage and no label wants him, just leave him be smh.
and that’s exactly why trinidad is here, to give that perception of ignorance and buffoonery as reason to keep perpetuating inequality. You don’t give the James Baldwins & Killer Mikes millions to enrich the masses you give the Trindad James’ and Young Thugs millions to infect the minds
@crooklyn…………..couldnt agree more with you. Its was totally intentional picking the biggest idiot they could find to paint a bad light on all. It just irritates me that some people took this guy serious like we picked his dumb ass. Fuckin scumbag media.
yea killer mike is a great speaker n is proud he went to college never tried to hide his past n fake that street shit like plies or rick ross much respect.Immortal Technique is also a great speaker for hip hop he has dope interviews his one with alex jones was really interesting he a expert on politics n history I heard bill o’reilly kicked tech off his show because he was making bill look like a fool with his knowledge and answers lol
@C…….lot of these rappers ain’t been picked by us for at least 5-8 years, they’ve been force fed.
killer mike as usual always reppin it right, the only dudes i want to hear speaking on hip-hop and the conditions are killer mike, m-1, stic.man, paris, wise intelligent, chuck d, immortal technique and ofcourse the blastmaster krs one
i do wonder where mike got his “official” date of birth for hip hop from…..i’ve always read it was august 11, 1973….when kool herc dj’d his sister’s back to school party in the rec room of the jects 1520 cedar & sedgwick ave
mike took it a step further going back to the speakers, Gil & The Last Poets, Malcolm, Huey, the speakers & speeches, heads don’t know there were hundreds of political songs in late 60s-70s. Herc is the birth of the dj.
Killer Mike The Truth