Rev. Al Sharpton is calling out young people for taking their right to vote “for granted.”
The Civil Rights activist and founder of the National Action Network made the comments on Sunday, Aug. 25, during a fiery sermon at the Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel at Howard University — Vice President Kamala Harris’ alma mater.
Sharpton told students at the HBCU in Washington, D.C. that too many young people obsess over social media and rap music, instead of focusing on getting informed and empowering themselves by voting.
“There’s going to be a crisis in your life, that you’re not going to be able to Google up the answer,” he said.
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Sharpton then reminded the students what’s at stake in the November election.
“Fact is, it was against the law for us to vote. In fact, people were killed for even trying to get Black folks the right to vote,” he explained. “Because if you vote, you’ll put people in power… And that is why, if they can get you to accept being powerless, you will never be a threat to the equal distribution of resources.”
He said too many younger Americans don’t bother to vote.
“Y’all were kids when Barack Obama was elected. You had no idea that your grandparents and your parents had to fight to even get us the right to vote. And if you understood that, then you wouldn’t be so cavalier about using your vote,” Sharpton said.
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He urged students to go to the polls and cast their ballots for Harris.
“We got 72 days,” Sharpton told the congregation. “[Republicans] are gonna come and throw all kinds of stuff at Kamala. They’re gonna try to twist your mind. Let’s just ride through the storm.”
He mentioned music legends James Brown, Aretha Franklin, and Marvin Gaye.
But Sharpton said instead of releasing music that stood for something like Brown, Franklin and Gaye, a lot of current hip-hop artists release songs that “degrade” women and the Black community.
He recalled getting a phone call from the “Godfather of Soul” a few weeks before he died in 2006. Sharpton said Brown expressed disappointment in the music he was hearing on the radio.
“He said, ‘I turned on the radio and every song, every rap I heard was degrading.’ I said, ‘Yeah.’ He said, ‘When you were growing up, you heard me sing ‘Say It Loud – I’m Black and I’m Proud.’ You heard Aretha singing ‘Respect.’ You heard Marvin Gaye singing about the war in Vietnam in ‘What’s Going On.’ He said, ‘Now all I hear is the N-word and hoes and b–hes,'” Sharpton recalled Brown telling him.
Sharpton concluded his sermon by making a correlation between rap music and self doubt.
“You know better than to degrade others, but you are permitted to degrade yourself. That’s why they can convince you that you can’t make a Black woman president,” he stated “That’s why you run around now talking about, ‘can a Black win?’ We already elected a Black and reelected him.”
You can listen to the sermon by Rev. Al Sharpton below at the 1:02:30 mark.
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