Hall of Fame Beverages, Inc (HFBG)

[Frzframe]

Who's Co-Opting Whom?
Thug Chips stir up salty trouble.

For as long as there has been alternative culture, there have been people trying to make a buck off it; hip-hop culture is certainly no different.

But one lawmaker from Queens, New York, isn’t amused by the products from snack and beverage company OG Nation. According to the New York Post, Councilman Leroy Comrie is peeved by products like Thug Chips and Atomic Dogg energy drink.

Comrie has been crusading against the marketing of gang paraphernalia. But he may have overstepped a bit when discussing food and beverage maker OG Nation, which is headed by ex-athletes Jim Brown and Larry Johnson: “It’s even more insidious because these are people that work directly with gangs … enticing people into thug life and gang life. It makes no sense to me,” he said.

Brown actually does have a history of working with inner-city youth, but not recruiting them into gangs. Comrie clarified his remarks in a New York Times City Room blog post. He acknowledged Brown’s philanthropic work, but questioned why “he would consider flooding our community with garbage.”

For its part, OG Nation fired back a press release, accusing Comrie of “the most insidious kind of racism, because it masquerades as piety, when it’s really just political grandstanding.”

While the Urban Dictionary has its own definition of OG Nation, we’re still wondering what Thug Chips (now mysteriously absent from the OG Nation website) taste like.

http://www.chow.com/grinder/4482