“Burn Hollywood Burn is a protest song. Has nothing to do with families, losing everything they have in a natural disaster.” Public Enemy's Chuck D calls out edgelords using his song to soundtrack online footage of devastating Los Angeles fires

Public Enemy, LA firefighters.

When Public Enemy's Chuck D wrote Burn Hollywood Burn as a scathing indictment of the film industry's treatment of black actors and the LAPD's infamous racial profiling for his band's third album, Fear Of A Black Planet, he could not possibly have imagined that, 35 years on, his song would be co-opted by online edgelords taking pleasure from seeing the destruction caused by devastating Californian wildfires.

But here we are.

Yesterday, January 9, the hip-hop legend called out those misappropriating the band's song in this insensitive manner, calling on those doing so to “learn the history.”

“Burn Hollywood Burn is a protest song,” the rapper explained on Instagram, on a post captioned 'PRAY 4 LA'. “Extracted from the Watts rebellion monikered by the Magnificent Montague in 1965 against inequality when he said ‘Burn baby burn’ across the air. We made mind revolution songs aimed at a one-sided exploitation by a[n] industry. Has nothing to do with families, losing everything they have in a natural disaster.”