Stephen Hill: Fights At BET Hip-Hop Awards Blown Out Of Proportion

[NelsonG]

The 2012 BET Hip-Hop Awards are set to air on Tuesday night (October 9), but during the taping in Atlanta on Saturday two scuffles broke out behind-the-scenes. Early reports of the incidents came from tweets and hearsay, and now BET’s President of Music Programming and Specials, Stephen G. Hill is explaining what really went down. In an interview with Complex Hill dismissed rumors that gunshots were fired, and chided reckless tweeters for blowing the situation out of proportion.

Hill was honest about the brief scuffle between Ross and Jeezy's crews, but notes that Ross took the stage just minutes later without any hint that something had just gone down. “There was absolutely an altercation behind the stage, it involved the crews of Ross and Jeezy," he said. "Ross and Jeezy passed each other in the hall. There was some shoving—it never turned into a fight. They realized it’s an awards show. They realized we spend a lot of money to make hip-hop look good on TV. We want to give them the same shining forum that other music forms get."

"Maybe some members of the crew weren’t thinking that way," he continued. "It was a dust-up, and it was over like that. I mean I’ve seen it on TMZ, there happened to be a mirror there, they weren’t throwing the mirror—it kind of just got in the way. If you look, people are trying to avoid the mirror as it falls. And Ross is walking towards the stage. This happened right before he went on stage.”

Initial reports said that there were gunshots fired, but Hill disputes that. “You heard about gunshots in the parking lot because somebody heard somebody say something, and they carelessly tweeted,” he said. “Now they may have heard pyro, but no one has said there was gunshots in the parking lot. Police would’ve closed this down a completely different way had there been gunshots. If there’s gunshots, your show’s not going on. Everything comes to a halt. Nothing came to a halt.”

“Again, reckless tweeting. One person said there was gunshots. Somebody took that. I used to do this thing when I was a little kid. I used to say something outrageous. I’d say, “I read that somewhere.” I wrote it down, closed my eyes, and then I read it, and so it’s true. That’s exactly what happens with Twitter. People read it, so they think it’s true, and people retweet it like, “Oh my God, there were gunshots.” Cause some fool tweeted, “I heard gunshots.” There were no gunshots.”

[url=http://rapfix.mtv.com/2012/10/02/stephen-hill-on-fights-bet-hip-hop-awards/]View the full article[/url]