While it is very rare for celebrities to speak out against the establishment, if this does happen then they are vilified in the media and will face many obstacles in their career as a result of their dissent. One of the most successful celebrities in the past few years to take a stand was Dave Chappelle.
His years in the entertainment industry had shown him the corruption that exists behind the scenes and how entertainers are used as pawns to advance the agenda of the ruling class.
When leaving his show and turning down a 20 million dollar deal he said, “I was doing sketches that were funny but socially irresponsible. I felt I was deliberately being encouraged and I was overwhelmed” and “I felt in a lot of instances I was deliberately being put through stress because when you’re a guy who generates money, people have a vested interest in controlling you.”
I cannot speak for Chappelle, but from an outsiders perspective it seems that he came to realize that the ideas that are put forth through the mainstream media are intended to make the population more disorderly, materialistic and obedient. It is possible that he began to see these kinds of degrading ideas in the scripts that he was getting from comedy central and wanted no parts in it, regardless of how much money they were offering him.
Now, years later Chappelle is promising to make a comeback, but this time around he wants to inspire other artists to become activists.
At a recent appearance, Chappelle told the audience that “The biggest enemy of an artist is apathy. A kid gets killed by the police and I buy a T-shirt and before I can wear that one, there’s another kid (killed) and I’m running out of closet space.”
After the appearance, Chappelle told the Associated Press that “I think it is important to be out now, but what’s going on in the world isn’t why I initially came back out. This is a very surprisingly emotionally charged time, so people like me, I think, are very relevant and necessary in sorting through all this information and emotional content, and when we are at our best, hopefully, we are doing a great service to many people.”
Artists truly do have a responsibility to be activists, as Chappelle alluded to in his comments, and hopefully his return will inspire other artists to follow in his footsteps and get involved in important issues.
Chappelle was even out in the protests last year at Ferguson, as he revealed in an appearance earlier this year:
John Vibes writes for True Activist and is an author, researcher and investigative journalist who takes a special interest in the counter-culture and the drug war.
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