Just as TV personality and host Van Lathan and producer Mona Scott-Young were scheduled to chat with ABC Audio about their new WE TV show, Hip Hop Homicides, the music world was coming to terms with another murder, that of Takeoff from Migos.
Takeoff, born Kirshnik Khari Ball, was shot and killed in Houston early Tuesday morning.
The show, which debuts Thursday, investigates what’s become a string of murders in the hip-hop community, from Pop Smoke to XXXTentacion — and now 28-year-old Takeoff.
“We don’t know what’s going on, but there’s nothing that’s going to come out that’s going to make it make sense,” Lathan says. “I can tell you one thing: whatever was the reason behind this, it wasn’t worth it.”
While the rap community previously lost Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls to crime, Lathan says the show taught him something new is going on. “Everything is changed … when you start to dissect it, you start to kind of get the feeling that nothing is the way it used to be, and that’s being reflected in the callous way a lot of these murders are happening. The brazen way.”
He adds, “When you have the clout, which is poison … The clout plus social media, plus some of the aspects of the music, is just this cauldron of dysfunction.”
Scott-Young comments, “The amplification, the ability to see the gruesome details play out right in front of you. It’s an assault on our sensibilities, as, you know, human beings, you know, coexisting on a planet together … we are so desensitized. It’s all part of a larger affliction that we really have to get to the core of, or we’re just going to become more and more diseased in the way that we’ve come to accept these horrible, horrible occurrences.”
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