‘Love & Hip Hop: Hollywood' pays homage to slain rapper Nipsey Hussle and urges people to end gun violence
The cast members of ‘Love & Hip Hop: Hollywood’ put aside their differences and petty drama to pay respect to late rapper Nipsey Hussle. On March 31, 2019, Nipsey was shot multiple times in the parking lot of his store, Marathon Clothing, in South Los Angeles at about 3:19 p.m. He suffered at least 10 gunshot wounds. The episode which aired on August 19, was shot on the day of Nipsey’s death and so viewers got to relive the entire event onscreen.
It is no secret that the rapper was well respected and regarded in hip-hop circles. So, the news of his death shook the entire cast of the reality show. They all came forward and paid their tributes to the late rapper. Millennium boy-band B2K dedicated their Atlanta leg of the tour to Nipsey, and rapper Fizz shared that he ended up crying on stage while performing because he couldn’t hold it back anymore.
In the same vein, we saw Jason Lee inviting OG rapper Yo-Yo to speak on his show ‘Hollywood Unlocked’ to share her thoughts and feelings about Nipsey’s untimely death, as she witnessed and experienced Tupac’s loss earlier. Tupac too succumbed to gun violence, so Jason felt Yo-Yo was the right person to give her two cents on the subject. Yo-Yo talked about what a great person Nipsey was, and how he valued his community and worked so hard to give back to the community. During the course of the conversation, Jason also revealed that he lost his brother to gun violence. Yo-Yo and Jason were also seen urging people to put guns down and focus on education to better themselves.
Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun safety advocacy group estimated that every day 100 Americans are killed with guns and hundreds more are shot and injured. It is important that the gun laws be made stricter and people put the guns down and pick up books instead. Yo-Yo too urged everybody to stop the violence and focus on education, uplifting and giving back to the community.
Catch all the drama of ‘Love & Hip-Hop: Hollywood’ every Monday at 8/7c only on VH1.