Rapper YG Is a Racist Pig, Say Chinese Americans

YG image by 5sr, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC by 2.0)

YG: First you find a house and scope it out. Find a Chinese neighborhood cause they don’t believe in bank accounts…

These are the lyrics of YG’s song Meet The Flockers from the rapper’s album “My Krazy Life.” The music video doesn’t do much better, as the video begins with two young men putting on their bandanas in their mouths and getting into a car. In less than a few seconds, the video shows the two young men pulling up to an affluent suburban neighborhood amidst the lyrics in the background saying to find a Chinese neighborhood. Armed with an automatic weapon, both men pull up to a home. After entering, the camera focuses on a picture of an Asian family.

Although this video and song is now almost two and half years old, there is still a lot of controversy surrounding Meet The Flockers. According to the Global Times, the video is now provoking ire from the Chinese community who say that they’re being unfairly targeted. YG appears to be only rapping about what he knows, but the Chinese community feel that the video reaffirms what they already know.

In the United States, Chinese-Americans are unfairly targeted, especially by African-Americans.  According to a study done by the San Francisco Police Department, 85 percent of physical assaults crimes involved Chinese victims and African-American perpetrators in San Francisco alone.  The video, according to the Chinese community, only motivates more of these crimes to occur.

Californian candidate for California State Senator Jane Kim sent out a press release yesterday, stating that the video isn’t only anti-Chinese. The Korean-American candidate states that the video is actually anti Asian-American. She has called for YouTube to take it down.

“The lyricism and imagery of this video is deeply offensive to Chinese-Americans, and dismantles community-based efforts that seek to build positive race relations among African-Americans and Asian-Americans.”

Rapper YG has previously served jail time for burglary, something that Asian Americans feel is being encouraged through the video. Kim’s press release also states,

“Our demand is simple, Youtube and Vimeo must remove these videos in compliance with hate speech guideline for online content. We also call on DefJam Records and Rapper YG to denounce this song.”

YG’s Meet the Flockers has recently surged in popularity, probably due to the attention being drawn to it. The latest comments on the video are coming from Asian users who, in rage, are using racist slang against African-Americans, with some inviting them to come and try this out in their homes, since they’ll soon find out that they’re well-armed. You can check out the controversial video below, which has yet to be pulled.