Hakki -------------------------------------------- 'Draft me!'
Once they wanted to 'fight the power'. Now they want to fight for their country. Whatever happened to US rappers, asks Dorian Lynskey
Tuesday January 22, 2002 The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/story/0,3604,637224,00.html
(...) Last month Canibus, a once hotly tipped MC whose debut album was produced by Wyclef Jean, released a song called Draft Me. Wholeheartedly supporting the war in Afghanistan, he urged, "Draft me! I wanna fight for my country/ Jump in a humvee and murder those monkeys!/ Draft me! I'm too dedicated to fail/ Justice must prevail, justice must prevail!" (...) Opposing viewpoints have been surprisingly thin on the ground from a genre that once produced such protest anthems as Public Enemy's Fight the Power and NWA's Fuck tha Police. In recent months several commentators have suggested that African Americans have good reason to resist the tidal wave of patriotism that is sweeping the country, citing Muhammad Ali's famous explanation for his refusal to fight in Vietnam: "No Vietcong ever called me a n-word." While such undercurrents certainly exist, they are as yet virtually inaudible in the music that one would have thought should be their natural platform. (...)