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JAY-Z wrote a guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, calling on everyone to work towards social justice, whether it is on a local level or national level.
"His is the kind of story that you can't ignore, and people are starting to see that what happened to him is not an isolated case," writes JAY-Z of Kalief Browder, who committed suicide after he was held without trial on Riker's Island, most in solitary confinement, for three years. "He's just one example in a system that is broken. We need to be the ones who fix it."
JAY-Z wrote that the impact of Kalief Browder's story has shown him the importance those types of projects could have. He is hoping that his next project, Rest in Power: The Trayvon Martin Story, will help "create a similar conversation that leads to change." JAY-Z will also be creating a program with National Geographic, handling race and inequality.
"But social justice isn't a political issue. It's a human issue," writes JAY-Z, before calling his readers to action. "It's a story of empathy. When we are able to identify that we are all not perfect and have compassion for someone else, we can move forward as a society."
Read JAY-Z's entire essay here.
