Brian Strumillo
Historical Protest Project
10/10/16
NWA against police brutality – violent or non-violent
The rap group NWA consisted of 5 prominent artists: Ice Cube, MC Ren, Eazy E, DJ Yella, and Dr. Dre. NWA is considered to be the pioneer in the subgenre of “Gangster rap”. Along with selling millions of records and achieving platinum status, they created great controversy in many areas. Their vivid lyrics glorifying drugs and guns, some considered to be unfit for popular American radio stations. However, the most controversial part of NWA is the way they expressed their hate for the police. Through their music, they were able to create and distribute multiple messages that reached millions of people. One of these messages included a protest against how police brutality is prevalent the black community of America was a large issue that wasn’t getting proper attention. The police force however saw NWA’s expression not as a non-violent protest, but as a threat to the police, instigating violence in the streets, and to create pure chaos. I am arguing that N.W.A’s intentions were purely creative to create awareness in a non-violent form of musical expression, and not to simply instigate violence.
The group NWA is depicted as “The worlds most dangerous group” in the original version of this photo. In my photo edit I wanted to create a connection between NWA, police brutality, and the movement “Black Lives Matter”. NWA was a popular rap group, that was very controversial when it came to police violence, and violence towards police. I overlaid a popular black lives matter movement saying “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” to link one movement to the other considering they were after very similar goals.
In this photo edit I overlaid the NWA main group members over a scene from the recent film, straight out of Compton. In this scene these two individuals are carrying two bandanna’s tied together walking towards a police line. This represents the Crips and the bloods “two prominent gangs on the west coast” joining together in the battle against police brutality. The NWA song “F*ck the Police” by the NWA members inspired this action in the film.
One of NWA’s most popular and controversial songs is titled “F*ck the Police”. In this photo edit, I “spray painted” Love instead of F*ck, as well as, made it seem the band was behind bars in this edit. Finally, I put in a “I love cops” sticker to create a sort of sarcasm and irony. This photo edit is thought to be from the perspective of the police force during this protest movement. In other words, this shows the other side of the coin.
In this Juxtaposition You can see on the left there is a woman handing out a flower to a police officer in a form of non-violent protest. This gesture is iconic and portrays the police force as “the bad guys” but yet this alone does not spark any forms of violent retaliation to or from the police force. The picture on the right shows NWA members performing a concert. On stage there is a “police line do not cross” tape. This represents many things, from NWA’s perspective it is a sort of mocking of the red tape the police force was trying to place on their freedom of speech. A long with that the words “police line do not cross” can be interpreted as, “no cops allowed up here”. The correlation between the two pictures is that they are both forms of non-violent protest, the argument can be made that the picture on the right instigates more violence through vivid lyrics and performance, than simply holding out a flower.
The form of protest strategy that N.W.A used to spread their message came in the form of lyrical hip hop/rap. This allowed them to reach a very large audience. The question is whether they were using a form of violent protest, instigating violence, or if they were using a form of non-violent protest just by exercising their freedom of speech. Throughout the edited images and video clips, I believe N.W.A. has made a strong case in their favor. Yes, the group was trying to shake up the status quote in a new and innovative way. Yes, their form of protest was very controversial. Yes, they may have instigated some forms of violence through their lyrics. The bottom line is that they did what they felt was necessary in order to create a movement of change in their community.