Rap the vote

Over the din of a thousand cheering audience members and pulsing rap music, Comcast news anchor Art Fennell's booming voice introduced some of the biggest names in rap music today.

Russell Simmons. Foxy Brown. Jim Jones. Papoose. Musiq.

The scene in Irvine Auditorium last night had all the trappings of a star-studded rap concert. That is, until the stars began to talk.

"If everyone in the country who was 18 to 21 was registered to vote, it would send a message to politicians that young people are a double-edged sword who can either vote for you or vote against you," Papoose said. "It would make politicians come to the table to talk about our issues."

Brown, who appeared in public for one of the first times since temporarily losing her hearing, added,"I know this event is about voting and participation, but it is mainly the misconceptions about rappers that I want to clarify."

The stars were on hand for the Hip-Hop Summit National Town Hall Meeting on Community Empowerment, the 55th such event that the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN) has sponsored since its inception in 2001. The national coalition, which was founded by rap mogul Simmons, seeks to use the popularity and influence of hip hop to fight poverty and injustice.

Philadelphia is a familiar destination spot for HSAN. In August 2003, a Hip-Hop Summit registered over 11,000 new voters in a single day.

Last night, businessmen and artists associated with the rap music industry mingled with Mayor John Street and Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.), whose district includes Penn, on a panel discussing quality of life issues in struggling communities.

James Peterson, an English professor at Penn State-Abington -- who as a graduate student Penn taught the University's first class on hip hop -- also joined the panel discussion.

Many of the participants emphasized voter registration and mobilization as one of the main reasons for convening the summit.

"When you pull that handle [in the voting booth], it lifts your spirit and allows you to join the community," Simmons said. "It makes you feel connected to something more powerful than yourself."

Fattah agreed. "I won my first election in 1982 by less than one vote per precinct. Kennedy beat Nixon in 1960 by less than one vote per precinct. We have to make it clear to young people that voting is not just in their enlightened self-interest, but it also helps better the entire community."

Street said that current events make it especially important for young voters to exercise their political power.

"Every time my children buy a tank of gas, they have an incentive to vote. When they turn on the news and see young people dying in Iraq, they have an incentive to vote," he said.

Kenneth Gamble, a black musician from Philadelphia, urged the black community to put an end to its internal squabbles and self-destructiveness and instead to organize itself and improve educational opportunities.

"Don't see this as a night when you came to see the stars," he said. "Something is wrong with the African American community. What's wrong is us. We need to organize."

Rapper Jaguar Wright, a native of the city, emphasized the need for rappers to convey a positive image and the influence that rappers have on the younger generation of Americans.

Rap "is an instrument that we have in our community to fight the oppression we are talking about here," she said. "This mic is extremely powerful."

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