Lupe Fiasco
By Sonia Montalvo
Kanye West and Lupe Fiasco are known for being rappers who share their views and opinions on all things current, and this weekend was no different. The Guardian reports both rappers shared their feelings about current race relations in America, in response to the Charleston Church massacre, where Dylann Roof murdered nine people at Mother Emanuel AME Church.
West, who headlined for Hot 107.9’s Birthday Bash Block Show in Atlanta, expressed his opinions on the church murders via a freestyle. In his second verse West raps, “See that’s the magic of racism, it works on itself/We hate each other, screw each other, kill each other/When we can’t kill nobody else/See that’s the magic of lackin’ resources, it works on itself/500 n-ggas gettin’ pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-popped/And North Carolina didn’t help/See that’s the magic of racism, it works on itself.”
Though West refers to North Carolina in the verse, it is believed that he is speaking on Charleston, which is in South Carolina.
Lupe Fiasco took to Instagram to express his thoughts in a three-part open letter he titled, “Dear White Supremacy.” The letter is written as a caption under three different photos of shooter Dylann Roof. The first two photos feature Roof burning an American flag and squatting for a pose over the flag as well. Both of these pictures are labeled in big letters “Supreme.” The last picture, a mugshot of Roof, is labeled “Regular.”
In part one of his letter, Fiasco states, “First of all you are not really that supreme. While throughout history [of] White Supremacy it must be admitted you have achieved some very dominant positions. These positions have been gained mostly through force or some biological agent such as disease that did a lot of the dirty work for you in advance. I mean anybody can use force on an unarmed populous and anybody can have smallpox. Not judging, just wanted to point out that having a disease that native folks aren’t immune to because they’ve never seen it doesn’t make you strategically smart or tactically superior, just kind of sick.”
The letter goes on to say, “For that matter, there is also nothing about you psychologically, philosophically, cognitively, academically, socially, architecturally, culturally or even financially that signifies a higher position above any other group,” he continues. “And to be diplomatic, there is nothing about you that denotes innate inferiority as well. So what you really are is something in the middle. You are regular.”
To conclude his letter, Lupe Fiasco writes, “If you wanted to get really ironic and meta about it, White Supremacy has to validate its own identity based solely on its relationship to other races! I mean now that’s what I would call joined at the hip. Without us there is no white supremacy because there would be nothing to be supreme over! That sounds so stupid but sometimes the truth is stupid.”
Each part of Fiasco’s open letter has garnered more than 5,000 views or likes and the letter in its entirety is currently making its way around other social media platforms.
