The Hip-Hop Generation Fights Back: Youth, Activism and Post-Civil Rights Politics

4. Hip-Hop for the Soul: Kickin’ Reality in the Local Scene

 91  4 HIP-HOP FOR THE SOUL Kickin’ Reality in the Local Scene I’m like Che Guevara with bling on, I’m complex. —Jay-Z I’m a hip-hop head. I listen to rap. I’m a Black boy from the ghetto. —Conrad [With] a lot of the hip-hop and the poetry and stuff, you can convey a message. And if you can get that message out to people, you can’t change the whole world, but you can start by a little piece. —Xochitl On a surprisingly warm day in March, I attended a “Youth Solidarity ” event at Bayview High School, sponsored by Teen Justice . The Youth Solidarity week was an annual event that Teen Justice organized on school campuses, which focused on raising awareness about various social justice issues. This year, David took a lead role in organizing the event, with a specific focus on garnering support for the youth center. I arrived at Bayview at noon, during lunch. It was a beautiful day, which was more evident as I met up with Griselda and the others on the senior quad. In this particular spot, it looked more like the campuses of California schools that I had seen in the movies: green grass against a backdrop of light blue skies and a view of the city off in the distance. Griselda, Jose, and Trisha were already sitting on a small hill, making “Solidarity” armbands to hand out to folks that were gathered outside. The armbands were made with red cloth and black lettering, similar to their banner, and written in different languages: Spanish, Vietnamese, and English. When I asked David, who smiled and gave me a hug when he saw me, what the purpose of the armbands were he told me, “We like to hand out the  92  Hip-Hop for the Soul armbands as a symbol of unity between the different folks here.” As I looked through the crowd gathered on the quad, several people had the band wrapped around their upper arms. The event seemed pretty low-key; I wasn’t sure what was happening next as students gathered and ate their lunches. Griselda motioned to David, who was sitting with his leadership class, to indicate that the guest speakers had arrived. I looked over in the direction she was motioning and noticed two African American men, dressed much like some of the youth that day: baggy pants and T-shirts, but a little more colorful than the standard white T-shirts that most of the boys wore on campus. In addition to the microphone one of them had in his hand, they stood out not only because of their age but because one of the men wore his hair in long dreadlocks and the other was wearing a newsboy cap. David went up to them, shook their hands, and then directed them to the middle of the quad. As they moved closer, I recognized them as Rashid Omari and Brutha Los, from the local hiphop group, Company of Prophets. “Hey y’all,” David said, speaking into the mic, a few people turned their heads. “My name is David and I’m part of Teen Justice and this is our Youth Solidarity week. Today, we’re organizing for a youth center on campus so we can address stuff that’s going on, like violence , in our schools.” He seemed a little nervous, I wasn’t sure if it was the setting—he seemed more comfortable in front of adults—or the fact that people were milling about, not looking at him directly. He continued, “Right now, I want to introduce Company of Prophets who are going to perform a few songs for us.” He handed the mic over to Brutha Los, who addressed the crowd. “Yeah, what’s up Bayview High School, we are Company of Prophets and we’re here with Teen Justice to talk about your schools.” They then went into a rap about public schools, which reminded me of “They schools,” by Dead Prez, but in a cleaned-up version, departing from “they schools don’t teach us shit.” As they performed, I noticed more people immediately gathered around them nodding their heads in seeming agreement with their words.1 I was impressed that the youth were able to secure a popular, political , hip-hop group, who were central to the Seattle WTO (World  93  Hip...