
Warzone is a new American hip hop released by the rapper Clifford Joseph Harris Jr. also known as “T.I.”. Warzone is a song about police brutality, released in lieu of everything going on in the world about police brutality. In the music video for this song, T.I. casts white actors to be the main characters and African American cops. This sets up many cases of repetition and thought provoking scenes that allows one to sympathize with those going through cases of police brutality against them. In this music video, the sense of realism will overwhelm the viewer with grief and sadness and truly grasp the viewers’ emotions. It allows one to be put in the place of others and feel close to how those going through police brutality cases feel.

The first way that T.I. connects to those viewing the video are his lyrics. He uses many different examples of expression and repetitive sayings to emphasize the cases of police brutality around America. The first expression T.I. uses to describe what is going on in the world, is “Warzone”. This is the name of the song, but it is a perfect description of what is going on in the world. The dictionary definition of a warzone is “a region in which a war is being fought”. This is an accurate depiction of our world today. There are sides that say that there is nothing wrong police and completely look away from the police brutality going on and then there are those who experience the police brutality and go through it. These two sides war over this topic and there have been riots that have been violent because of this topic. T.I.’s use of this word and song title is very clever and allows the viewer to have an image of what this world is going through. When there is a warzone inside of a country, big or small, there is change needed in that area and that is what T.I. is beckoning for by using this expression as his title and throughout the song. 

The rapper also uses “I cannot breathe” throughout the song. It is a part of the chorus. The chorus goes, “…. Hands up, can't breathe, Hands up, can't breathe, Hands up, can't breathe, Hands up, can't you see we livin' in a war zone?” ("T.I." - War Zone Lyrics). The “I cannot breathe” saying came from Eric Garner when he was being choked to death by policeman outside of a store. It has become a very popular saying when it comes to opposing of police brutality. By using repetition of this saying, T.I. is constantly reminding the viewer and listener to not only enjoy the beat, lyrics, and cool video, but remember that this video is to put light on the darkness that is police brutality and make people aware of it. 

The rapper’s beautiful use of repetition is not the only thing that helps emphasize his message. T.I. uses beautiful lyrics that convey a major message of how messed up the system of America is. T.I. says this in his second verse, “Pardon me, somebody tell me what happened to Alton Sterling, killed Philando right in front of the girl, And the world saw, And was like hell naw!”( "T.I." - War Zone Lyrics). In a matter of four lines, T.I. accurately describes the murder of two African American men and the feelings of the world when they saw Philando’s video that was released by his girlfriend. He later compares this world to modern day slavery and that the Emancipation Proclamation is just a piece of paper. His statements there really make the viewer/listener think about how true that is. It begins a whole train of thought and it is not hard to come up with the conclusion that African American’s are still treated like slave in some instances. If the USA is treating the Emancipation Proclamation like a piece of paper with no meaning, then there is really no point in having it around still. Word without action is dead. 

A final way that the rapper Clifford Harris was able to get his message across was by those he casted in his music video. He is known to have predominantly African American actors in his music videos, but for this one, he switched things up. He depicts the murders of Eric Garner, Philando Castle, and Tamir Rice with white victims and black cops. At the very beginning of the video, it shows an innocent white boy giving his mom a hug goodbye before he goes out plays in the park. He strolls along to the park and pulls out a fake gun (it has the orange tip clearly) and pretend to shoot it in the woods. Before you know it, two African American cops show up and without hesitation, one of them shoots the innocent boy. This strikes a match in the viewer’s heart. It was easy to get sympathetic with those going through police brutality cases, but T.I. continued in the video. He proceeded to show a “white” Eric Garner, doing nothing, but hanging outside of a store and it shows African American cops tackling him for no reason and then choking him to death. This white victim, African American cop storyline continues for the rest of the video. For instance, later on there is a white lady who is forced to sit in the back of the bus because no African Americans want her sitting next to them. 

In conclusion, the main point of this video and song was to not just emphasize the “Black Lives Matter” campaign, but it was to emphasize the “All Lives Matter” campaign. It was formulated together to call for change because that is what America needs right now and can not continue without. T.I. is not the only celebrity coming out with different songs and actions to shine a light on police brutality in America. There is a popular song called “Formation” that is against this and there are also many popular players in the NFL that are sitting during the national anthem in revolt to show that the issue is still not fixed.  
