Writer Toure has the Hip-Hop community and political arena buzzing after penning an essay describing a drug crisis that permeates America and Hip-Hop.
Rapper Killer Mike opted for a much more controversial approach to illustrating a crisis deeply embedded in the black community.
The Atlanta rapper tweeted the song “Reagon” to MSNBC The Cycle host Toure, who has been in the news as of late for his Washington Post article “How America and Hip Hop Failed Each Other.”
“I am very confident no other rap song articulates the point of your Hip Hop Reagan article as my song “Reagan” @Toure,” Killer Mike wrote. “You shud check it.”
Toure responded via a retweet on Twitter, “You’re right.”
The cultural critic wrote President Nixon’s war on drugs helped reshape the black community and “mold hip-hop.”
Hip-Hop, Toure said, is a music and culture whose undercurrent remains black male anger at a nation that declared young black men monsters and abandoned them, killing any chance they had at the American Dream.
In “Reagon,” Killer Mike is critical of Reagon’s War on Drugs campaign and the black community’s response to it.
He raps, “We are advertisements for agony and pain/ We exploit the youth, we tell them to join a gang/ We tell them dope stories, introduce them to the game/ Just like Oliver North introduced us to cocaine/In the 80s when the bricks came on military planes.
Toure and Killer Mike opened the door for a much-needed dialogue on the war on drugs in the black community. Despite taking different approaches, they both utilized their crafts to take aim at an epidemic crippling the urban black community.
Head over to The Washington Post to view Toure’s piece “How American and Hip Hop Failed Each Other” by clicking here.
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Listen to Killer Mike’s “Reagon” below
The Government placed drugs into the black community. Nothing has a more damaging effect on the the black community than drugs. The black community was strong, the Reagon had to put a stop to it.
Yes!
It’s sad. Though it is a global problem, drugs somewhat changed our whole family structure. Everyone black person knows someone in their family that is on drugs. I know at least ten in my family and i’m not talking about marijuana
And another thing, along with slavery and Jim Crow, the country will never address what Ronald Reagon did to us. America has a weird fetish w/ black people. Now the prisons have enslaved us. That’s why I know black are a strong group. Through it all we still rise
My nig Killer Mike hit it on the fukcin nail. Damn
yea big s/o to killa mike
I think it’s silly to blame the government for blacks wanting to use drugs. Nobody put the crack pipe up to you guys lips and said smoke. and to the person above, why do black always want to bring up the past? My grandfather came here. We’re polish and experienced racism too and we were able to climb the social ladder. Why can’t you?
Cody it’s because your ancestors could assimilate easier to “white America”. Black people cannot hide their skin color and in turn are forced to endure racism on a wider scale.
Please don’t give me that BS. Black ppl parade around on tv and music videos bragging about selling drugs. It’s like you guys love and embrace negativity. I go on World Star and see black people fighting and acting like a bunch monkeys. So you are going to blame the government for that? Now you guys are taking over reality t.v. with antics. Don’t blame, white ppl or the goverment for that.
@Cody Yeah, you also failed to mentioned many Polish, Italians and Irish folk changed their last name to blend into society. What are black folk gonna do? Change their skin color? You don’t know my plight, so don’t dare speak on it unless you are sincere in your heart about helping
It’s up to us to end it. But w/out jobs the drug problem will never end. Some turn to the selling drugs to put food on the table. How can you tell someone who has no other means of income to not sell drugs. It aint happening
Niggers still using slavery as an excuse. what else is new
It’s funny how some ppl can talk behind a cpu screen. I’m sorry “Brock,” but I won’t entertain your ignorance. I will, however, educate you. African Americans have been battered and abused in this country, yet we are still making strides.What you may see on television, world star is a result of the hate and enslavement of African Americans. No other group of ppl endure what African Americans have endured in this country. We came to this country and were stripped of our values and customs. As slaves, we were beaten or killed if we even attempted to read or aquire some form of education. Slave owners would place bets and have their slaves fight each other. Slave owners raped the women. Slave owner placed enmity between slaves to establish control. Now today, we have our young black men going to jail over petty drugs crimes. They shut our black men out of the work force, gave them drugs, and throw them in jail, for selling what they initially gave them. Now our young black men are getting incarcerated. There is much more to the story.But racist white and the goverment orchestrated us to be this way. You don’t raise a dog in a junk yard and expect it not to be vicious
This country is a bunch of cowards. We are like illegitimate children the father does not want to acknowledge. Why build an economy around the incarceration of a group of ppl. Our country incarcerates more ppl than any other country in the world. We are first world country but we are so backwards
It’s funny how most rappers who gotta deal rap about selling and pushing drugs. The rappers who are against will never get signed smh
thats the messed up thing about it. media is promoting this shit
No one is putting blacks in the predicament they’re but themselves. Get over it and move on
Toure and Killer Mike are idiots. Killer Mike wants to talk Reagon but has killer in his name. Yea we’re supposed to take him seriously
I am happy they are discussing this issue. Drugs is a huge problem in the black community
We can talk about this topic all day long, but like drugs the problem is an addiction. Hard to break an addiction
this issue is very complex. we need to get the root cause of the drug epidemic and why it has affected the black community so greatly