Suge Knight announced
at the first West coast summit on Thursday that he aims to create a hip-hop
union for artists. Knight said that he aimed to ensure that artists has pensions
and health care benefits. The overall summit was a success, with the Honorable
Minister Louis Farrahkhan giving a 90 minute keynote address. In the address,
the Minister urged rappers to sanitize their lyrics and their images. "From
the suffering of our people came rap,” Farrakhan said. “That should make you
a servant of those that produced you. That should make you a servant of the
‘hood.” While the Minister preached about being positive, Suge Knight’s time
at the podium sharply contrasted the Minister’s. Knight took his time to hurl
insults at Xzibit, Tray-Dee, Snoop, Dr. Dre, Puffy, Eminem, Cash Money and Master
P. Knight also offended many women in the audience
Former Death Row artist Jewell, who was in the
crowd got into a heated confrontation with Knight. After Knight questioned why
certain rappers never made it to the summit, Jewell stood up and said "maybe
it was because they were tired of his “employees” confronting them and threatening
to do them harm." The security handling the event, The Fruit Of Islam asked
Jewell to sit down, but Suge request they let her speak She stated that she
“could no longer sit and watch the devil do his work," and said that she
had been one of the first artists signed to Death Row and that she helped name
the label. She again excused herself. Knight continued speaking saying “another
thing I wanna mention is, know your role. It’s a lot of men runnin’ ’round here
tryin to be the women, and a lot of the women is tryin’ to be men.” The comment
was not directed to women in the audience contradicting some published reports.
The comment was apparently directed a Jewell, as Knight followed with “eatin’
coochie ain’t God-like”. At that point another woman in the crowd became irate.
The woman had brought her son, thinking it was going to be a positive meeting
on improving the community through hip-hop. Knight apologized and ended his
speech.
Russell Simmons, who helped organize the event
with Minister Benjamin Muhammad defended Knights presence, saying that he wanted
a variety of people present at the summit to speak their minds. Despite a large
number of Crips and Bloods that were present, their were no incidences of violence.
The overall summit was a success. The Hip-Hop Summit Action Network will team
with Rap the Vote and the National Black Youth Vote Coalition to enlist celebrity
rappers to help drive youth voting and education.