They are putting Rappers in Jail with their own lyrics

That’s in part because of a controversial step by prosecutors to cite Young Thug’s lyrics, music videos and social media posts as part of “an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy.” Young Thug lyrics like “I killed his man in front of his momma” and other verses in songs by Nicki Minaj and other artists were suddenly being used as evidence against the rapper, who’s accused of racketeering spanning over nearly a decade.

Other artists, recording executives, and politicians mobilized after the targeting of rappers for their creative content. On Monday, the California state assembly unanimously passed a bill, AB 2799, which would restrict prosecutors from using a musician’s lyrics against them as evidence in criminal or civil cases. The legislation will be signed by Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. A similar bill failed in New York after passing that state’s senate.

And many in the industry are actively lobbying for federal legislation, particularly the Restoring Artistic Protection Act — or RAP Act — that is currently making its way through the U.S. Congress after being introduced last month. Many decry the legal system’s attack on Young Thug as well as other hip-hop artists nationwide as a fight over artistic expression for young Black men who have been unjustly targeted for their creative output.

“When we start criminalizing the First Amendment, you no longer have a democracy, and democracy is already hanging by a thread,”U.S. Rep. Jamaal Bman (D.N.Y.), told that he was one of the RAP Act sponsors and added that he thinks the bill will pass the House by the end the calendar year. “It’s another attack on Black men, it’s another attack on Black art, and we have to do everything we can to protect Black art and also Black freedom of speech.”

As of 2020, Bowman said, prosecutors in over 500 criminal cases have used artists’ lyrics as evidence against them — and virtually all of them were young Black male rappers. Bowman said cases involving lyrics from rock or heavy metal were often dismissed before being tried.

Earlier this year, the subgenre of Drill Rap came under increased scrutiny when a prosecutor in Bronx, New York, indicted 20 individuals as part of what’s been called “Operation Drilly.”Louisiana rapper Mac PhillipsAfter using songs like “Manslaughter”, prosecutors convicted a man of manslaughter. “Camouflaged Assassin”His conviction was overturned and he was freed from prison 20 years later. The U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested 21 Savage, a Londoner. This left his immigration status in limbo for two years.

Researchers have detected a bias in how hip-hop artists’ work is perceived. Dina LaPolt is a veteran entertainment and music lawyer who has represented many rappers. Maryland has a similar case. involving the use of a rapper’s lyrics as evidence that she called “blatantly racist”And said set a “dangerous precedent.”LaPolt later created a whitepaper titled “Rap Music and the American Justice System”These cases are representative of the number in the country.

In one study LaPort cited, participants were presented with an identical set of song lyrics — but when told they were rap lyrics and not country/folk, they were likely to find the words violent and autobiographical. “People were shocked. And then when I broke down the country lyrics, they were really shocked,”LaPolt stated. “And then they just started taking a hold. The people started getting involved and were saying, ‘Oh, my God, this is egregious. We have to do something about it.’”

LaPolt’s research has started to take root across the music industry as well, and she feels that the urgency shown by those in both the Recording Academy and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has lit the fire under lawmakers to allow them to tackle the issue in just a two-year span.

For decades, hip-hop artists have fought against racist stereotypes that rap lyrics and music encourage violence or that their art is a literal fact-based extension of the rappers’ own lives and experiences. It’s a battle that extends back to the uproar over the 1988 N.W.A song “F— the Police” or albums by 2 Live Crew that got banned from store shelves in the late ’80s and early ’90s.

“I had to pinch myself and say, ‘Oh s—, here we go again.’ I’ve been in the business going on for decades, and I’m reliving things that I saw as a young kid that are now happening to me, but I never in the history of this business heard of a RICO case being brought against a label,”Kevin Liles, a former president of Def Jam and founder and CEO at 300 Entertainment, said that. “It was hurtful, harmful, but it made me gear up and say, ‘The job’s not done.’ If I’m going to be in an industry that’s going to continue to be targeted, now that we have the No. 1 music in the world, I’m going to help make policy to protect all artists, to protect Black art and to protect freedom of speech.”

Industry stakeholders like Liles and big names in rap have endorsed the RAP act as well the state bills. Jay-Z, Meek Mill and Stacey Abrams publicly supported the New York legislation. She expressed her concernsNearly anyone can use the written word to communicate their ideas. “proof point”In criminal cases. Labels like Universal Music Group and Warner Records have supported the federal RAP Act.

In a letter addressed to the California Senate, Mitch Glazier, chairman of RIAA and CEO, noted that artists like Eric Clapton and Johnny Cash have sung about shootin’. “a man in Reno just to watch him die”Or how “happiness is a warm gun” — but that their words shouldn’t be taken literally and used against them in a criminal courtroom.

“Rooted in imagination, creative expression’s greatest capacity is to lift us out of the real world and to present us with the unexpected, the unlikely and the unthinkable. Hyperbole and fantastical imagery are customary, and often necessary, elements of that creative expression,” Glazier wrote. “Yet, when rap and hip-hop artists adhere to this time-honored tradition of make-believe, their lyrics are too often — and unfairly — taken literally, stripped of the poetic license afforded other genres. While such mischaracterization may be uneventful in everyday music consumption, its application in criminal proceedings can skew the truth and destroy artists’ lives.”

Harvey Mason Jr., CEO of the Recording Academy, said that his organization’s lobbying arm worked directly with the federal bill’s other sponsor, Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Georgia), to craft the language of the bill and rally support from industry stakeholders. He added that these issues are what make the Academy and the money it gets from the Grammy awards telecast possible.

“Not having this legislation has allowed people to utilize people’s creativity and lyrics against them when we know that’s not fair,”Mason said. “I don’t think anybody in the studio when they’re in their cars in their garage or when they’re writing music, they shouldn’t be thinking about, ‘Is this going to be something that I shouldn’t say in art and music?’ We should be able to express ourselves. We should be able to say things that are on our minds and our hearts or in our imaginations without fear of somebody bringing this up in a courtroom.”

California State Assemblyman Reginald Byron Jones-Sawyer, the sponsor of the state’s AB 2799, agreed that there’s been real “urgency” among music industry professionals, saying that prosecutors’ use of lyrics raises serious First Amendment concerns.

“The best thing we can do is have a serious conversation about creative expression, and really about the social fabric of what’s going on right now,” Jones-Sawyer said. “AB 2799 will give judges needed guidance for evaluating whether creative expression is admissible during a criminal trial and provides a framework which will ensure creative expression will not be used to trigger or reinforce stereotypes or activate racial bias.”

LaPolt has, however, created a working group to document similar cases in which people were convicted because of the lyrics to their songs. If these bills become law she and her co-workers will be able to mobilize courts to overturn some convictions.

Young Thug, Gunna and other defendants remain behind bars awaiting trial. Liles, who testified for them in June, stated that they were coping well despite the real emotional and financial toll of being detained. “Both of them are now away from their families and unable to generate revenue,” Liles said. “You can never normalize being in a cell or getting away from your family’s life.”

His An emotional testimony, Liles defended Williams’ character but also wondered why he had to testify to defend the good that hip-hop and Williams in particular have done in the world, saying that when he founded the YSL label with Williams, they said, “We’re going to change some lives, and that’s what he’s done.”

Even so, prosecutors haven’t backed down on their case against Young Thug, who has been Accused of multiple felonies — including possession of drugs and illegal firearms, and of renting a vehicle used in a drive-by shooting that killed an alleged rival gang member. You can read the full sentence here. HearingLast week, the lead prosecution called the rapper “a dangerous person… YSL is a dangerous gang, and this is the man who leads that gang, and he’s dangerous.”

But Liles feels Young Thug’s case fits into of a long pattern of injustice in the U.S.

“We live in America. I don’t think that this is a short fight,”He stated. “We need to look at ourselves in the mirror as a country and ask ourselves why does this keep happening in the criminal justice system… I will stand at the mountaintop and believe exactly what Martin Luther King Jr. said: ‘We have to allow the arc of justice to bend in the right way.’ And right now, it is not bending in the right way.”