BY MADELEINE BYRNE DECEMBER 8, 2017
Twenty-four-year-old Roc Nation artist Vic Mensa was asked what makes someone a threat to the government in his most recent Montreality interview. In reply, Mensa dropped some knowledge about the exact moment governments get nervous. In doing so, he made illustrative links to assassinated Black leaders from history.
“Anybody becomes a threat to the government when you start to talk about hidden truths, anything divergent from a revisionist-history agenda and American.” After pausing, Vic continues, “What do they call it, patriotism? …When you’re in school as a kid they don’t teach you the things you need to know to be informed and to be a free-thinker,” Vic says. “They teach you the things you need to know in order to play a part, to be a cog in a system.”
People can be “vocal” Mensa adds, saying that you can “even be anti-establishment and vocal.” But the real problems start when radical or revolutionary political leaders “start connecting the dots” and seeking out coalitions with people outside their immediate communities.
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