"It’s one simple thing that would get rid of all the problems in the world," Savage Mode rapper 21 Savage said on Wednesday, during a visit to The FADER's New York office.
"If no Americans had no guns they’re wouldn’t be no police killing people," he continued. "That’s the easiest and simplest way to solve it. To take everybody’s guns, not just the civilians. Take the police’s guns too."
He continued, saying that in the wake of recent mass shootings and police killings, he did not feel that protests — on social media and America’s streets — have affected meaningful change. “People been protesting since racism was going on,” he said. “It ain’t much protesting, screaming, hash tagging, that ain’t really gonna stop shit…They did it a million times worse when Trayvon Martin got killed. Guess what happened? Some more black people got killed.”
Of the Black Lives Matter movement, he said: “Not all lives are being taken, so that’s why people are saying Black Lives Matter. You don’t really see police gunning down white men every other day. Or gunning down Indian people every day. It’s young black men who are getting gunned down a lot. That’s why people say Black Lives Matter. But all lives matter. Everybody’s life’s important.”
He won’t vote in the upcoming 2016 presidential election, he said. “I don’t really think voting changes nothing, personally. I don’t believe in voting because they’re gonna pick who the fuck they wanna pick. Who knows if them votes even be real. They could say, ‘Oh, Trump got this many votes.' Trump could have not got that many votes.”
He hasn’t followed the campaign of the Republican nominee closely, he said. “I don’t really follow up on what [Trump] do. I’m not a social media like, internet type, news and politics type. I just know that he’s said he hates anybody that ain’t white or some shit like that. He anti-American or something. I’d have to look him up and see what he’s being saying at his rallies to really give you a good answer.”
