Vic Mensa is an outspoken proponent of human rights and is very unlikely to pipe down when he sees something he doesn’t agree with. That’s the impetus behind his new “We Could Be Free” video. The video features footage of the occupation of Palestine by Israeli forces and compares it to video from various protests around the US in recent years in response to a perceived uptick in police violence against minority communities.
“We Could Be Free,” from Vic’s debut studio album, The Autobiography, imagines a time when humans are able to put aside differences of race, religion, party, and other tribalistic concerns and achieve true freedom from violence and injustice. As Vic himself puts it, “I wanted to make a video to show solidarity with people struggling against oppression all over the world. I took scenes from the military occupation of a village I visited in Palestine and juxtaposed them with racial violence in America to show how similar our struggles are and imagine a world without division.”
Vic’s also addressed a number of other hot-button or controversial topics, from gun control to for-profit prisons in recent interviews, and focuses much of his music on similar concerns, including his own drug addiction and recovery.
