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.H I P H O P M AT T E R Sfor social change represents a noteworthy moment in the movement.Even so, it oƒers no guarantees about its future political identity or e‰cacy.According to the HSAN’s mission statement, it is “a non-profit, non-partisan national coalition of Hip-Hop artists, entertainment indus-try leaders, education advocates, civil rights proponents, and youth leaders united in the belief that Hip-Hop is an enormously influen-tial agent for social change which must be responsibly and proac-tively utilized to fight the war on poverty and injustice.” The group promotes itself as the biggest organization of its kind and frequently implies that it is best suited to realize hip hop’s political potential.While naming himself chairman, Simmons, in a surprising move,chose Dr.Benjamin Chavis Muhammad as CEO and president of theHSAN.Chavis Muhammad was a forty-year veteran of the civil rightsstruggle in America.His baptism into politics began at the early age of twelve, when he became a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).Chavis Muhammadwas part of the Wilmington 10, a group of African Americans whowere wrongly convicted of setting a white-owned grocery store onfire in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1971 during a period of local racial unrest.They were later found innocent of the charges, and a judge released them from prison after they had served four and a half years.The experience reinforced Chavis Muhammad’s steely commit-ment to racial justice and equality.He went on to become a full-time activist and one of the civil rights movement’s young lions, immers-ing himself in grassroots activism.When he was chosen as CEO andexecutive director of the NAACP in 1993, he called it a logical pro-gression: the culmination of a life’s eƒort devoted to the struggle for racial equality.Aware of the dwindling influence of the NAACP at152 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]