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News > Culture

New Beyonce Album Features Malcolm X, Police Brutality Victims

  • Beyonce performs 'Take My Hand' at the 57th annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles, California on Feb. 8, 2015.

    Beyonce performs 'Take My Hand' at the 57th annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles, California on Feb. 8, 2015. | Photo: Reuters

Published 24 April 2016
Opinion

The pop star’s new album was released in a surprise special event and featured the mothers of two killed Black men, Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin.

Beyonce cemented her status as the queen of surprise releases Saturday night by making public a completely new album and videos called "Lemonade" which featured footage of Malcolm X and mothers of two Black men who were killed on the hands of white police officers.

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Social media users and Black Lives Matter activists hailed the special event and the album as some of its videos featured appearances by the mothers of two Black men, Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin, whose shooting killings by white men sparked protests and ignited debate about racism against minorities in the country and police brutality.

Brown's mother Lesley McSpadden is seen crying as she holds a photo of her late son who was shot dead by a white policeman in the state of Missouri in 2014.

Meanwhile Martin's mother Sybrina Fulton is also seen holding a photo of her son, who was shot dead at the age of 17 by George Zimmerman, in a case that sparked national outrage in 2012.

Beyonce also made a point to highlight Black women’s struggle in the United States as one video featured a footage of civil rights hero Malcolm X saying: “The most disrespected person in America is the black woman.”

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Her latest politically-flavored album comes few months after she released a music video of her single “Formation” in February where she also touched on police brutality and racism in the country.

In that video Beyonce's performance featured her and dancers wearing outfits that paid tribute to the Black Panthers, the radical socialist organization in the U.S. that challenged police brutality against African Americans between the 1960s and 1970s.

The video was praised by many among the Black Lives Matter activists and those campaigning against police brutality while some conservatives saw it as an anti-police statement and called for boycotting the pop icon.

WATCH: The Black Panthers

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