At Wednesday night's (Oct. 14) Billboard Music Awards, Killer Mike accepted the first-ever Billboard Change Maker Award for his work as a musician and social-justice activist.
The Run the Jewels rapper was presented with the inaugural award by Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms from the APEX Museum of African-American history in Mike's hometown.
"Kids out there that sing and dance: What you do is worthy," Mike said in his acceptance speech, emphasizing to the youth that look up to him that they should use their talents and their platform to effect change in their communities. "You are artists and your goal should be to express the very reality around you in the very most beautiful or ugliest of ways you see fit. Kids who run and dance and sing and jump and all that, all the things they tell you don't matter -- you matter more than you know."