Hey, Jay Z: If You Really Wanna “Occupy”, You’d Be In A Tent – F%@k Your T-Shirt!

Nov 14, 2011 6 Comments by
Priscilla Grimm, I agree with you for taking Jay Z to task on his exploitative actions regarding the Occupy Wall Street Movement. Selling t-shirts that are pulling from the moment of OWS protestors and not donating a dime is cause to Put His Ass on Blast.

Jay Z is an over-rated rapper who has stepped on a lot of toes while climbing on the shoulders of many to get to the top and sticking his dick in very interesting holes. But let me be clear.

A lot of “celebs,” both black and white have been stopping by Occupy Wall Street for Anachist cred. Then as fast as they arrived, they have traveled back to their nice housing and relatively excluded lives, while many soldiers have been pitching tents in snow, shit, and with homeless folk who have been forcibly planted by local enforcement as a diversion.

The pimp-like moves of notable 1 percenters have been something I pointed out when Russell Simmons and Kanye West brought their tired, raggedy assess on the stroll a couple of weeks ago. Namely, Kanye wearing a pricey gold chain, and Simmons not being called out for his Rush Card follies. The Rush Card was a pre-paid credit card venture targeting people of color, poor people and the youth, that promised to assist people in building credit, but was a sham that overcharged card holders and didn’t build shit but Uncle Russ’ portfolio.

Russell to Jay: " Can a nigga borrow a dollar?"

Also, Priscilla, I wholeheartedly reject you arguing that Occupy Wall Street is the most important social movement since Civil Rights. Your pompous assumptions is what we call in the hood as having your flat, “Ass on Your Shoulders”.

You see Priscilla, while you were dry grinding to “99 Problems” in the club, or your mother was finally learning how to do the Cabbage Patch to “Baby Got Back” the both of you’s were dancing to a social and cultural movement that even has you using its vernacular. Hip Hop.

Today you can’t go 10 minutes without a commercial or a news anchor using hip hop vernacular or a popular movie blaring the latest hip hop song as the backdrop. Hip Hop used to be that black shit that those type of people did. Today, everybody talks the lingo, wears the dress, wants to fuck Kanye, or singing “Black and Yellow”. Hell, even the Jews have stake in it with their wonder-rapper Drake.

Pricilla Grimm

Now if you want to talk exploitation, let’s have a conversation in which we bring the important social movement to the table that pre-dated your shit by about 35 years.

In fact, the audacity of hip hop and its radical roots is intertwined in your shit too, Shawty.

Don’t get it fucked up. Occupy didn’t just fall out of the air, it is a continuum of protests that have been occurring since Civil Rights. It would’ve been well noted if you could have called Jay Z out for pimping out another social movement pushing for progress as we simultaneously exploits a musical genre that changed the social, political and cultural climate of America.

A little information for your Negrophile records, hip hop that was played at one pointed blatantly challenged the status quo. However, you are a little too young in your Suburban education to know that. Oh yes, I am assuming.

This is why I disagree with your description of which you used to castigate Jay Z. As you said he had “the political sensibility of a hood rat”; however, I will challenge you two meth addicts and throw in an Oxycontin abuser that you don’t even know that a hood rat may fuck a lot of dudes in the hood, but that doesn’t mean she can’t read or isn’t politically astute.

Priscilla, Jay Z didn’t just fuck for beats to get all of that dough. His is quite political, just not how you like it. And your urban jab actually confirms why some folk aren’t feeling Occupy Wall Street’s over-educated, White lean. But I guess you are speaking with the sensibility of an Sub-urban Rat that is simply the left side of a vulva.

And in the words of my alter ego, a hood rat from South Central, “Occupy these nuts, bitch.”

 

Activism, Entertainment

About the author

Eco.Soul.Intellectual is a Los Angeles native living in the NYC Metro area. A former print journalist turned blog junkie, Eco.Soul is an adjunct professor, cultural-social-political critic, and traveler who is still trying to figure this shit out.
  • Prosepetals

    I keep coming back to this entry (I enjoy your blog, by the way, though I’ve never commented – I especially liked your commentary about certain ‘responses’ to John Lewis’ arrival at Occupy Atlanta…especially since I was there that day and witnessed first-hand the initial rift that transpired).

    I think *most* of us agree that Jay Z’s particular brand of exploitation is – well, in a word, repugnant. And I think *many* of us agree that certain celebrity exploitation is (much as I hate to say it) expected. And I know that there are at least *some* of us who are of an age (or at least of experience) that recognize the continuum of the Civil Rights movement and its influence on Occupy. (And some of us even have first-hand memory of the political underpinnings of Hip Hop *chuckle*.)

    I will, in the interest of honesty, admit to being torn, though, in your response to Grimm. I think part of my hesitance to agree fully -even while understanding the frame of reference- is that her ignorance to the history you articulate so eloquently is not willful most likely. Byron Williams shared an article in HuffPo last week that saddened me – even while it didn’t surprise me. 

    I don’t know much about Priscilla Grimm, nor will I pretend to – beyond her being an Occupy “journalist”…but my guess (I’m assuming here, too) is that she is ignorant to the history through little-to-no fault of her own – as are many of her contemporaries…as I was when I graduated from high school more than 20 years ago and only learned as time passed and I made a point to learn as much as I could independently. There is a part of me that *fully* agrees with you that a harsh counterpoint is necessary when dealing with the young & naive who are in desperate need of a wake-up call to life’s harsh realities in these Untied States. There is a part of me, too, that wonders how much can be expected when much of Civil Rights history has been limited to a single speech in high school history, and when so much history must be unlearned and relearned at the university level. A lot of people cringe at the notion that “ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking it” – which is on par with “guilty til proven innocent”. Perhaps seeking common ground and a broadening of historical awareness is a more ideal approach…though I’m not stating unequivocally that such is the case.

    In my own life, the main people I work toward educating are my own kids (and sometimes their friends who become extensions of my family). Unfortunately, not all kids in their age bracket have someone to provide more complete information to them. *sigh*

    Anyway, I continue to enjoy reading you, and I thank you for sharing your thoughts. :-)

  • Anonymous

    Wow! You said EVERYTHING that I was thinking and wanted to convey in my recent post about this topic. Granted, we don’t see eye to eye on Jay….but I’m >< here with you on Priscilla.

    Her comments were very pompous and arrogant, and I personally feel that the situation could have been parlayed into something that benefited OWS…had she not run off at her mouth. In fact, I'd say that SHE has the political sensibility of a hoodrat.

    Regardless of his intention, I do think that Jay's message of OCCUPY ALL STREETS is more inclusive and better identifies where the movement should go (or should have started). There are people (mostly minority) who have been experiencing economic injustices for decades, and for THEM, that shit didn't start with Wall Street and it certainly won't end with Wall Street. And to even imply that OWS is even remotely comparable to the Civil Rights movement?? I read that and said GTFOOHWTBS!

  • http://profiles.google.com/ecosoulintellectual Organic Intellectual

    Proseptals. I embrace your viewpoint, totally. It is one angle to a prism in this complicated view. I must admit that I am not upset at Grimm, its just that I pointed out a since of ignorance and over privileged purview that actually illuminates the supremacist and classist thinking she swears she abhors. But that is the perfect imperfections of struggle. You must have a narrow vision to drive through a lot of the angst. However, in order to grow and continue, you must open. Hopefully we all do. Keep teaching and preaching.

  • Ankhesen Mié

    *bows to the mistress*

  • Prosepetals

    Sends virtual hugs…I think we all do, yes. :-)  

  • Leo the Yardie Chick

    Why on earth did Jay Z think this would be a good idea?