Lauren Coleman, President/Founder – Punch Media
One of the most unfortunate things about the current Time magazine article which is currently gaining mad buzz, is that it so poorly fails to address the strong impact that urban youth/hip hop lifestyle has played in these historically high numbers of a veritable rainbow of young voters.
Undoubtedly new media in the form of on-line and mobile phone platforms, use of which is simply second nature to the 15-29 year old demographic, is responsible in large part of the mobilization of messages that are catapulting young voters to add the current political serial to its array of media-meshing activities in a big way. But what the mainstream so often fails to realize is that when you combine the power of this technology with hip hop culture, essentially youth culture worldwide; the impact grows exponentially.
Thus, make no mistake, it is not just the pseudo-hip outreach of prior Rock The Vote tactics of yesteryear that are speaking to white, black and Latino youth. Heavyweights and powerful, creative messages from the world of hip hop have taken outreach to the next level and made it cool in the process! Hip Hop mogul Russell Simmons has been tireless in encouraging youth to sit up and take notice of politics via something they all know and love, hip hop thanks to his Hip Hop Summit Action Network and a variety of techniques including mobile phone promotion. And no one could look at the brilliantly portrayed viral video support for Obama which has been streamed and viewed to over 10 million people and counting and not see hip hop written all over it. This, out of the mind of rapper and producer Will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas. Ubiquitous hip hop player, P. Diddy, no matter what your feelings on him, has also been utilizing viral video to directly reach his masses of fans to urge them to add Brand President to its list of many hip and trendsetting things to do. All men, unfortunately, but that’s a topic for another statement.
In the meantime, just remember that the kid perched defiantly next to the on-line version of the Time article with his backpack neatly placed on his shoulder, is probably bumping Kanye or 50 in his iPod within that backpack right now. It’s the strength of that culture, no matter how much heat it has taken recently and will take in the future, which is an incredibly integral part of not only this country’s youth but youth across the world. And the beautiful thing is that this time, it’s actually also drawing in political interest from young, black males for the first time in a long time!
To leave out these very important points and examination, is like leaving out part of America itself. Maybe the the writers at Time don’t get out enough.
