If John Brown Were a 21st-Century Jew

This is AWKWORD…

Labeled “Antifa militant” by Andy Ngo and “quite profound” by Chuck D of Public Enemy, AWKWORD has fought for justice and equality through protest song, political organizing, digital strategy and street journalism for nearly a quarter century. He is a co-founder of TEN DEMANDS, co-creator of Ten For Justice: The Road to Abolition, and founding member of Our United Left.

Raised by an activist mother radicalized during the Civil Rights and Vietnam War eras, AWKWORD converted from troubled graffiti artist and Nazi destroyer — angry and acting out at the world’s injustices — to productive organizer at 16, when he collaborated with the Anti-Defamation League to establish what would become his (predominantly Christian, conservative) high school’s annual Diversity Day. That year, he also created his school’s Holocaust Remembrance Day, and spoke for the first time at the town’s Martin Luther King Day celebration.

At Vassar College, AWKWORD served as co-chair of the Student Activist Union, co-founded the Justice Group, and earned his degree in Sociology, with a focus on the intersections of race and class, the prison industrial complex, and homelessness and the politics of public space.

Since the early 2000s, AWKWORD has organized with rapper Pharaohe Monch and anti-gun violence nonprofit Guns 4 Cameras; lobbied New York State Congress for the repeal of the Rockefeller Drug Laws; sued New York State to reinstate the 2020 Democratic Primary and add Bernie Sanders back on the ballot; worked pro-bono at Green Haven maximum security prison, an alternative-to-incarceration center and a number of teen centers, after-school programs and homeless shelters; created rap songs and videos used or sponsored by Occupy Wall Street, the New York Civil Liberties Union, The Ocean Project, and the union movement in Wisconsin; presented on abolition, labor organizing and Hip Hop education as a keynote and guest speaker for adults and students; and served as strategic consultant to Songs for Good, Deaf DAWN, New Leaf Vegans, and Guns 4 Cameras.

AWKWORD has also toured the United States as a performing artist; served as an Audiomack Verified Tastemaker, spotlighting alternative Hip Hop music; acted as brand ambassador for Aerosoul Limited; produced cultural content for Mass Appeal, Elemental, YRB, RIME, and Fly Paper; managed Nigerian American rapper Chisom; secured hundreds of premium press placements, including Complex, MTV, VICE, The Fader, Prefix Mag, Hot 97, XXL, The Source and Vibe, as well as Shadowproof, The Appeal, Common Dreams, Daily Dot, The Nation, Huffington Post, Village Voice, MSNBC's The Grio, and Daily Kos; and released the first-ever 100% for-charity global Hip Hop project, World View, with all profits going to educate and empower at-risk youth to reduce gun and gang violence in urban areas.

Most recently, AWKWORD has been organizing with TEN DEMANDS and delivering timely social justice content through his AWKWORD INTERVIEWS youtube series.