I listened to Chuck D speak and it was awesome.

I was less than a year old when the rap group Public Enemy released its seminal 1990 album Fear of a Black Planet to the masses. I was not even born when they released, It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Back. And yet I felt connected to the psyche of a man who is 31 years my senior and who talked about situations that I never dealt with. I never lived in an America where segregation was rampant, or as a white man, would've never dealt with the consequences of such a thing.

And yet this man is truly a man of warmth.

About 200 people I'd imagine showed up to hear the man speak, and he seemed to care about every single one. He was more honest than expected (although, I can't imagine a person as frank as he's been in his recordings being dishonest, I guess) and made his simple point for us to accept responsibility, not get trapped in materialism, and to save up and try our best to change our surroundings. History was brought up as a means to self-actualization. Whether it was music history, hip-hop history, or just history of culture regardless, ignoring the past only means that there's going to be a dearth of creativity later. (This example also led to a cute story where he brought up that the Rolling Stones took their name from a Muddy Waters song. This was just cool info to know.)

He also laughed at the Soulja Boy/Ice-T feud.

Then he said that people should take their place in society and do what we can to avoid the world being torn apart, either literally or figuratively. And it was a unifying thought. A unifying thought from a man that once told us to fight the power and that Elvis never meant crap to him, two things that I'm sure he still believes to this day.

Thank you, Chuck.