Snoop Dogg’s recent video for “Lavender” ended with the Doggfather shooting a fake gun at a fake Donald Trump, and it ended up angering quite a few people in the Republican Party and the White House, even getting Trump’s Twitter fingers into a frenzy. T.I. and Bow Wow have both weighed in already, and Common is the latest to speak his piece on the situation.
On his way out of the gym, TMZ ran up on the Chicago rapper and actor to ask him for his take. Common doesn’t think it’s bad for hip hop at all, referencing the genre’s deep history of political activism and support for free speech. Ever the scholar, Common specifically draws hip hop’s political legacy from Public Enemy and KRS-One to Kendrick Lamar.
While Snoop Dogg hasn’t been the most politically outspoken rapper (except when it comes to marijuana legalization), that doesn’t preclude him from ever being political. However you feel about Snoop’s actions in the video, they’ve done their part in driving conversation and even acknowledgment from the establishment.