If You Bump It, They Will Come

Rap the Vote (logo above) is one of many hip-hop based organizations trying to register voters.

Inside the studio of East Village Radio on the weekend before the New Hampshire primary, the hip-hop activists cue up their mental scripts while awkwardly climbing past each other for their turn at the mic. The low-power underground FM station broadcasts from a Manhattan storefront the size of walk-in closet. As is often the case when hip-hop and politics are brought under the same roof, things are cramped, disorganized and getting hot.

"We're back," says DJ Ariel, the mellow-voiced hostess of the Soulution Sunday Brunch. "The subject of today's show is the hip-hop generation and the youth vote -- or more specifically, the lack of the youth vote."

It's a question that has loomed among political strategists, youth activists and educators for decades, and one that seems to take on a more desperate tone every four years during the presidential election: How do we get young people to the polls? Sitting to DJ Ariel's right is George Martinez, Blackout Arts Collective cofounder, and Martha Diaz, President of the National Hip-hop Association. Both of them are right in their element. If the subject is voter apathy, they say, it's time to teach through hip-hop.

"Today's youth," says Martinez, "you can't talk to them unless you're talking about hip-hop." A professor of Political Science at Pace University, the 29-year-old was born in El Barrio and laid down his musical and political roots in the Bronx under the B-boy tag "Rithm." Diaz agrees. The former high school teacher started the National Hip-hop Association (NH2A) as a vehicle for education reform, "We need different interpretations and different insight into what's going on. We need to get young people connected and involved in the political process."

Hip-hop's recent domination of the Grammy Awards is an indisputable indicator that the underground music scene has emerged as a cultural and economic powerhouse. But as Martinez points out, hip-hop's political relevance -- at least in terms of elections -- is still up for grabs. And now, with the 2004 elections coming on fast, this has led several hip-hop organizations to declare a political call to arms among the hip-hop generation.

This might be easier said than done. The National Hip-Hop Association, the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network, Rock the Vote, and others are all mobilizing to carve out a slightly different, sometimes conflicting, vision of hip-hop's political identity. What's at stake is not only which white guy is sitting behind the oval office desk, but whose voice is behind the microphone of hip-hop America.

Where My Young Voters At?

Martha Diaz of the National Hip-hop Association

As presidential candidates crisscross the country to mine the electorate for any new or swayable voters, young voters (18 to 24 or 18 to 30 depending on whom you ask) remain as elusive and aloof as a bad dancer who's avoiding the prom. According to Political.com, this is especially true among minorities and disenfranchised youth in urban and rural areas, who have lower voter turnout rates than white suburban youth.

Multiply this generalization by the fact that young voters as a whole traditionally have the lowest turnout rate of any age group. Naina Khanna of the League of Young Voters says that only 32% of 18 to 24-year-olds voted in the 2000 presidential election. "And that's 10% lower than the number that voted in the 1992 election," she says. This is a far cry from the politically tumultuous days of the 70's when voters age 18 to 24 headed to the polls at a rate of more than 50%. The number has deflated every decade since then.

The reason for the drop? Well, the explanation most young people give is that voting is simply not an important part of their daily life, and they don't see their concerns or their beliefs reflected in the political debate. In regards to the current election, DJ Ariel relays her listener's frustration. "We have all these different characters up there telling us, "Vote for me, vote for me,' and they all sound the same . . . They don't necessarily speak to young people."