Waka Flocka Flame Defends Chief Keef: ‘They Make a Kid Look Like a Villain’

Waka Flocka Flame has come to the defense of machine gun-brandishing 17-year-old Chicago rapper Chief Keef, arguing that, despite the recent controversy surrounding him and his beef with murdered rival Lil JoJo, critics should allow the teen room to grow, before judging him.

"I feel like he's being more so labeled. He's a 17-year-old kid," Waka explained in a recent interview. "I get to see how people judge me and what I've seen and I couldn't see. Instead of helping a kid, they bash a kid. Adults are supposed to teach, not punish. If you see him doing the wrong things, give him the opportunity to learn instead of bashing him. So I just feel like they overdo it. They make a kid look like a villain."

Back in August, elder Chi-town MC Lupe Fiasco raised the teen's ire, when he attempted to advise Keef on the danger of his influence.

"Chief Keef scares me. Not him specifically, but just the culture that he represents, specifically in Chicago," Lupe said. "My family lives in Chicago. So my nephews, my cousins, my friends, and my peoples they all in those hoods that he represents. When you drive through Chicago the hoodlums, I don't want to call Chief Keef a hoodlum, but the hoodlums, the gangsters, and the ones you see killing each other -- the murder rate in Chicago is skyrocketing and you see who's doing it and perpetrating it, they all look like Chief Keef."

Keef's response was typical for a 17-year-old, but vicious nonetheless. "Lupe fiasco a hoe ass n---- And wen I see him I'ma smack him like da lil bitch he is #300," he tweeted.

On Christmas day (Dec. 25), an aspiring rapper named JayLoud was gunned down in Chicago, for wearing a sweatshirt adorned with slain Keef rival Lil JoJo's name.

Meanwhile, Keef's debut, Finally Rich, sold 50,000 copies in its first week, good enough for a No. 5 spot on Billboard's 200 chart.