Van Lathan Asserts The “Internet Is Getting People Killed”
Van Lathan has a new gig as the host of Hip-Hop Homicides, and has revealed what he’s learned most since doing the show.
On Wednesday (Dec. 28), Lathan sat down for an interview for VLAD TV where they spoke about the new show and the number of rappers killed by gun violence. After running through a list of deceased emcees, Vlad asks about the most shocking thing he’s learned from being attached to the crime series.
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“How much the internet is getting people killed,” he said. “Without a doubt.”
“I was profoundly changed by doing Hip Hop Homicides. I talked to eight mothers, a father, I talked to several people’s kids,” Lathan, 42, expressed. “I just see the pain that a lot of this stuff causes.”
The Higher Learning podcast co-host continued, “So, for me, the reason why I say the internet is because there’s scorecards now and in a lot of our cases, if the internet wasn’t a suspect, it was an accomplice. It was the place where everybody was goading one another, it was a place where you would get the clout. It was the audience that pushes your buttons to go and do something or have something done to you.”
Later in the interview, the former TMZ producer added that he isn’t blaming the internet for the calamity because these unfortunate acts existed before the internet boom.
“What I’m saying is, I really didn’t realize how much we would be talking about tweets. How much we were gonna be talking about people that dropped their location.”
One of the most recent Hip-Hop deaths, PNB Rock was believed to be shot and killed due to the artist’s location being public. Likewise, Pop Smoke was shot and killed in a home invasion after unintentionally posting his location on social media.
Watch Van Lathan’s interview above.
