I feel so inspired. You did that to me. I’m trying to remember a time when I had this feeling, I can’t. A time separate from studying theories and really getting down to the nitty gritty of what people think and feel. Its been a long time since I’ve gotten so passionate. Its been a while since I’ve still felt so passionate after the event was over.
You said, “Knowledge is strength. Wisdom is power.” I’ve always felt that I had power. However, I know now, that this is real power. Power to get my out of my comfort zone and actually tell people how powerful the event was last night.
I love hip hop. I feel like that statement is over-used, that it doesn’t encompass my passion for the institution and the music of hip hop. The political clout and power that hip hop is unique and unmatched by any other institution, at least in my knowledge. I don’t just love to listen to it, I love to research it. I’ll spend hours on end immersed in finding out the foundation of hip hop, why it is profitable, the power that it has, its principle players, and important periods of influence.
For a while now, I’ve been trying to find a way to incorporate my two passions; feminism and hip hop. Last night and right now while writing this, I cried because I have two so conflicting passions, passions that I love with my whole life, my being, and that I trust with my future. My ultimate dream is to start, build, own a series of center that, by using hip hop, helps stop the rape of black womyn. I have been struggling to create an outline for what this would look like and how it would function. Thanks to you I can actually see a plan, I see a role model, I see hope and the fact that I can fuse two of the most conflicting identities available to human kind, feminist and hip hop head. I see there actually can be an innovative take on education, without being in the confines of a classroom. I feel we need that to breakthrough, to those who reject or don’t have access to a classroom. I had never seen anyone use hip hop to directly teach a group of people. You were saying everything that I wish I had the platform and the bravado to say. I was impassioned to be even more critical of the images that I saw across my computer and television screen and the power that those images have.
Even today, I still feel empowered, more beautiful, more confident. Thank you. Thank you for doing what you do, thank you for who you are. Thank you for your gifts to me and to the world. Thank you for caring.
