Killer Mike and Dr. Cornel West Speak on the "N-Word"

Yesterday the homie Ed Garnes, co-founder of From Afros To Shelltoes (FATS) organized and hosted Sweet Tea Ethics, a town hall/panel featuring Dr. Cornel West and his older brother Clifton. It was a pretty cool turnout...I mean, the event started at 5pm and Ed said folks was already lining up at 2:30. I got there at 5, and didn't get the best view to be honest...but I was still able to hear what was going on.

Ed, who wrote the first piece I ever read on Killer Mike, asked me to put them in contact with each other because he wanted Mike to fall through. One because you know Mike would have some jewels to contribute to the conversation...and two because it was appropriate that he be there since Mike rapped on Dr. West's Hip Hop project a few years back.

Wasn't sure if the big homie was going to be able to fall through but he did, almost on cue. Dr. West name dropped Mike while answering a question when he walked in, they spotted each other and he invited him to join them.

I wasn't planning on doing any filming outside of the allotted interview time I got with Dr. West, but I figured I'd might as well catch some of this (please excuse the shaky hand footage, I was peeping over a book shelf). The video starts as Mike is answering a question from an old head who asked "why do we still say nigger in 2010?" Mike answered the question, but the elder interrupted him and said "much respect, but I was addressing Dr. West." Mike kept going though, haha...and answered the question well enough for Dr. West to pretty much agree wholeheartedly.

I'm going to post up the video of my interview with Dr. West sometime tomorrow.

Be sure to start visiting the FATS website to stay up on when more events like this will be going down. I told Ed people like him and things like this are needed more now than ever since Tavis Smiley won't be conducting his State of the Black Union town hall meetings anymore.