A rapper with charity: T.I. and Thanksgiving in Atlanta
Written by Michael Vass
I have a problem. As is well known to long-time readers of my blogs, I don’t like gangsta rap. I find the music to be repetitive, pro-violence, pro-drug, pro-illiteracy, pro-death. I find the entertainers to be some of the worst examples of what (primarily but not exclusively) Black men are and can be. In general I believe that gangsta rappers deserve to be locked-up in a jail cell like the felons they are and/or wish to be seen as.
That being said, long-time readers also know that I love it when celebrities and entertainers go out of their way to make a donation or hold an event that benefits those of us in need. I am especially pleased when that entertainer or celebrity is Black. And I hate it when the major news media ignores or demeans the act of generosity with negative news that is not relevant to the charity.
I think you can see where this is going.
T.I., Clifford Joseph Harris Jr., spent Thanksgiving in Atlanta. He was there with 22.000 friends that day. And not one gunshot went off, nor did any woman lose her clothes while shaking her ass for a camera. I have to say this because of the extensive history of T.I. breaking the law, involvement in fights, illegal gun possession and other such acts.
This was not a rap event. This was charity. And it was an apparently record-breaking act of giving, though not the first time this rapper has done so.
This Thanksgiving Clifford Harris raised $100,000 for Hosea Feed the Hungry and Homeless, and did so in 2 hours. He followed this up with volunteering to help serve the 22,000 people that were fed at the Atlanta Brave’s Turner field.
This had nothing to do with the various community service requirements that T.I. has had to serve for his multiple violations of law. He did it because for all his faults he believes in charity. Such can be seen from his history of giving.
He has helped with Hurricane Katrina relief, worked with troubled youths at Paulding Detention Center, provided scholarships for single parent families at Boys and Girls Clubs, and giving away 200 bicycles to neighborhood children in the Boys and Girls Club in Atlanta. For all the things I don’t like about the rapper, I must commend his acts of charity (the ones he has done without court order).
So here I am commending the charity of a rapper that deserves to be lauded for his selfless acts. Yet I am severely at odds with his history of violence and breaking the law, and the music he performs.
Perhaps this is an example that even the most insulting, crude and ignorant of people have redeeming qualities. Perhaps I am too harsh a judge of things that I find offensive and detrimental. Perhaps Clifford Harris Jr. is growing up and becoming a man; not in terms of his age or ability to father children but in terms of his actions in society.
Whatever the case, I am glad to hear of and mention the good work that was done for so many this Thanksgiving.
