I like hip-hop. Contrary to the beliefs of some of the more conservative among us, I think the form has some artistic value and can certainly be enjoyable to listen to.
I am finding it increasingly more difficult, however, to overlook some of the disturbing trends I’ve seen growing in modern hip-hop culture. In many ways, I shouldn’t be surprised-these trends often parallel some of the general cultural developments I’ve outlined before, which are spreading more widely in America.
Regardless, the growing emasculation of hip hop and the devolution of some of its leading figures into insecure, gaudy, feminized, and at times frankly absurd caricatures of men (and women) has gotten me thinking lately.
Hip-hop, as we know it today, is becoming an increasingly feminine culture.
Behind all the posturing you see from these men is a tremendous amount of insecurity about themselves, their status, and their own masculinity, as well as quite a bit of feminine style and energy.
This is part of why they promote such exaggerated, dysfunctional caricatures of what it means to be a man (ex: urban gang culture). They have no model for real masculinity because, in the matriarchies they come from, there simply are no fathers or other stable male authority figures to show them what that looks like. So, since they’ve got no template to go on, they simply make it up and try to derive new ways of “proving” their manhood.
The Journey To Urban Manhood
“Taking yo’ bitch” is one way to prove maturity. In order to make this work, you must be sure to let everyone know you banged that other dude’s girl via music or social media. Be sure to rap or instagram about it. Simply having sex with her isn’t enough. Rather, it is the fact that everyone else knows you had sex with her that marks your manhood. So make sure they find out-attention whoring is your friend.
Snagging “the bad bitch” is another way to show one’s manhood. Again, you can’t just bang her. You gotta talk about it, rap about it, or tape it if you can. The world needs to know that you have the girl they want. Not necessarily the girl you want, but the one that they want.
This is similar in some ways to how women often choose men based in large part on their status or ability to impress her peers. This growing internalization of female attraction cues is leading to a larger number of male groupies in the world of hip-hop, men who (like women) prioritize status and peer approval over raw physical attraction.
“Shinin” is another way to prove to the hip-hop world that you’re a man. To do this, you’ve gotta have the biggest chains, shiniest/newest cars, flash the most money, roll on the biggest rims, and just generally spend like money is not an obstacle.
The key is not merely for you to enjoy your cash or the objects it can buy, but rather to make sure that everyone knows you’ve got that cash and how much it cost you to get those objects. If nobody knows, then it is really not worthwhile.
Oh, and forget about building wealth—this isn’t how you prove your manhood. You’ve got to spend as much as possible, so don’t bother with things like home ownership. Lease and rent everything you can if it makes folks think you’ve got more cash.
Attention whoring via social media is another key to establishing your manhood. Instagram, Facebook and Twitter offer worthy platforms for you to prove your achievement of the many “manly goals” listed above. You can show off your bad bitch/other-dude’s girl, let the world see your new ride, and even show off your cash flow directly.
We’re used to social media attention whoring being a predominantly female phenomenon, but in hip-hop culture it is just as much a male one. Just as teenaged girls have to document every little socially relevant step they take, these men must do the same.
The Feminized Product
For all the posturing and attempted maintenance of an outwardly sexual, hyper-masculine frame, these men seem largely incapable of showing the independent spirit that is so often the essence of masculinity, the spirit that allows a man to go his own way even without extensive peer approval or adulation. Instead, like women, they are slaves the collective and have always got to prove themselves to everyone else-what the world thinks ALWAYS matters.
It isn’t just about getting yours, its about making sure everyone else knows you got yours.
It is in this way that the culture reveals its growing femininity as it directly parallels female social structures. Just as girls work tirelessly to secure peer approval and conform to group social norms while rarely deviating from them, male adherents to the hip-hop culture and their deities in the entertainment industry work tirelessly to win the praise of their peers and posture to look as integrated with the culture as they can.
Like women, they rely heavily on fashion trends and attention whoring to aid them in these endeavors. Like women, they gossip and feud (or “beef”) over trivial things. Like women, they’re obsessed with brand names and jewelry. Like women, they love bright jewelry created by females, skinny jeans originally designed for feminine forms, Birkin bags and even skirts.
Truly masculine men once ruled the world of hip-hop. Much of the foundation for what we now know as game came from within the urban communities that birthed this culture, and we who benefit from the growth of a community surrounding game (which ultimately gave rise to sites like this) owe a lot to that. Increasingly, I fear that this legacy is being left behind, another victim of the west’s seemingly unending bid to neuter the remnants of its masculinity.
Read Next: The Best Book Of 2012 For Men
Tru dat.
“gay-ngstahs” behave exactly like senseless animals, and who else behaves like irrational animals? Grrrrls.
Ha-ha! Kenny West….
The name of the first poster is the only acceptable reply to this article from a straight man.
Another idiot that misses the point.
Athlone I love your writing.
I don’t know who I love more, Roosh or Athlone. Keep it up guys.
The days of Schoolly D and NWA are long gone. Hell, 3rd Bass had more balls than today’s rappers. Other than Def Jux and the Wu-Tang, modern rap sucks.
They’re playin’ themselves – Jeru The Damaja
Very insightful. As usual.
Women and men raised solely by women do not know what true masculinity looks like. They are drawn to the braggadocio and indiscipline of ersatz masculinity but turned off by the quiet competence of true men.
It seems like the American underclass male (black, white, & hispanic) is becoming a weird amalgamation of Alpha male and female.
They’re Alpha in the sense that they WILL kill you for the right reason, are socially dominant, and (like it or not) often attract females en masse.
At the same time, there’s everything described in this article combined with the complete inability to get any emotional perspective. If somebody disses you, does it REALLY matter THAT much? To the point of killing or being killed? Seriously?
So you’ve got the feminine lust for drama that Rollo describes (can’t find the link, but he has a great post on why chicks fight like hell over the stupidest things) combined with masculine violence and aggression: stupid chick drama ending in manly shootouts to the death. At the same time, nobody learns the masculine virtues of discipline and responsibility, and neither the men nor the women demonstrate the feminine virtues of cooperation and compassion.
The result is that Eminem’s “Love the Way You Lie” sums up a disturbingly high percentage of American relationships.
And if we don’t turn things around, get ready for it to head to a posh suburb near you.
Yep. It’s like female backbiting, pettiness and status whoring enhanced with testosterone, positive feedback and status jockeying. Basically, fags in high heels with a bad attitude and automatic weapons.
Discipline helped the Roman soldiers to conquer the Mediterranean. And to defeat the undisciplined Gauls.
I’m not surprised that hip-hop has come to this. This feminizing of hip hop culture has been happening for a long time but in a more subtle way. The main reason it’s come to this is because the ghetto has become a matriarchal society.
Women run the ghetto since they are the only (relatively) stable adults around. Without powerful male figures present use as examples to mold themselves, young black men growing up in there pick up all of their mother’s habits. The preening, the feminine fashion sense, and grudges that are characteristic of female behavior are passed on to these young men. Those, like Kanye, who go on to have influence and power then affect the greater whole of the society through their celebrity.
T. Ricky Raw, of therawness.com saw this, 5 years ago, in his post, the Myth of the Ghetto Alpha Male:
“Ghetto men have a reputation for being tough guys. To the untrained eye it may seem the problems many ghetto guys have with violence and the legal system are a result of them being textbook alpha males. But that’s only partly to blame. These problems actually come about not totally because of manhood run wild but because a combination of testosterone running wild and the feminine side running wild.”
He this goes on to point out the subtle ways women’s fashion and personal habits influence ghetto black culture even during the 90’s era of hip hop.
“Sure a lot of male tendencies are going to show on the surface. These guys are young and are bursting with testosterone after all. But look at a lot of the other behaviors that are there also. Sitting on the stoop getting their hair braided by other girls. Long t-shirts that go down to the kneecaps and look like skirts. Colorful clothes. Obsession with fashion, shopping, shoes and accessorizing. Love of jewelry. Grooming obsessions that would put metrosexuals to shame. The more you think about it, the more you’ll notice and come up with your own examples.”
Here’s a link to the original article via the Wayback Machine the one that’s up on his website. It is slightly different that was redone and doesn’t contain the last quote but read that one as well.
http://web.archive.org/web/20080118172754/http://therawness.com/myth-of-the-ghetto-alpha-male/#comment-443
The difference between real toughness and posturing:
http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/toughenough.html
http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/hollywoodmacho.html
“…Women run the ghetto since they are the only (relatively) stable adults around…”-you called it dude wow
Really great insights here…a few years back I started noticing that the line between hip hop and R&B had become so blurred as to become meaningless, rappers were beginning to act like diva singers instead of the perspicacious poets they once were. The spirit of creativity and boundary-pushing was tossed aside and the attention-whoring so well detailed in this article replaced it.
I think the obsession with “hating” is an important signifier of this: nowadays, criticism of the norm within (so-called) hip hop is automatically categorized as “hating” and therefore bad, but hip hop had never been like that, it had always embraced the tradition of challenging the established, and that’s precisely how it developed as an artform. Again, after getting past the machoesque posturing, it’s a tendency that pretty closely imitates female social dynamics. The end result is that honesty and rational thought get sacrificed for the sake of feel-good consensus-building.
Superb article as usual, Athlone.
> “I started noticing that the line between hip hop and R&B had become so blurred as to become meaningless”
Like Hollywood movies, mainstream hip hop now follows a script designed to appeal to a wide audience. These days, almost all big budget action movies have one or two chick moments: claymores and 50 cals ripping the place to shreds but the hero has enough time to get down on one knee and declare his undying love to the female lead.
There’s a formula behind the handbags, checkerboard tats, and the men-in-tights looks in contemporary, mainstream hip hop. And, since these hip hop productions are just like Hollywood, they are influenced (or ruled?) by the gay makeup people, choreographers, etc.
Soon, hip hop will be like my new favorite movie: The Flight of the Wildebeest
http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3ssrdv/
The collapse is near, prepare for it.
perspicacious +1
To get big in Hip Hop, you have to mirror the larger culture. Not just that of inner city ghettos. And everywhere in the West, chicks with dicks are the new alphas. Guys that like to show off their clothes, muscles, cars, handbags, guns, dicks, cash, butts, whatever. And rag on others like a brood of bored bitches. And, they aspire to “success” in venues where they are judged by their “superiors.” Don’t know if it started with Saturday Night Fever, but getting the girl by “being judged” by implicitly presumed alphas (in the old fashioned sense) to be better than the other guys at twisting and turning like a little girl looking for approval and attention, certainly was reinforced by that testament to schlock.
This IS the new “masculinity.” It is what gets guys laid these days. Guys that split logs, build things and just quietly kill those that could use a good killing without any more ado, are simply too “booooring.”
Such is life in Dystopia. And such will be her death as well. Thank goodness.
Good points.
Absolutely…simply being even a DOPE ‘rappity ass rapper’ doesn’t cut it anymore..
The rappers who bleed into the commercial zone and get some fame and money, usually it’s because they advocate those shallow feminine values, that helped them to get there. But I don’t think that commends it. Older rappers who payed their dues must be shaking their heads.
This guy Ka from brooklyn got me back into hip hop, no swag bullshit here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKlCUHjU7p4
Wtf is a RAX?
One thousand dollars in cash.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=racks
(I had to look it up, also.)
I stopped listening to hip/hop when 2pac and Biggy died.
Lol it sure is a fag fest now….roflmfao
I think you got out about 5 years too early,but I hear you…
“In the Absence of Fathers, A Story of Elephants and Men.”
http://thesestonewalls.com/gordon-macrae/in-the-absence-of-fathers-a-story-of-elephants-and-men/
“Eighty percent of the young men I have met in prison grew up in homes without fathers. The problem seems clear. When prisons and police replace fathers, chaos reigns, and promising young lives are sacrificed.”
Great post, the quality of Hip-Hop has really gone down the tubes. It’s incredibly disappointing.
Hiphop is where it belongs…underground. This shit is rap/crap consumed by females and herb squares not in the know. For starters, DJ Premier, Tony Touch and J-Love are a few who promotes the authentic shit. One last thing, the country ass South fucked the game up. Yeah yeah i know Outcast and the Goodie Mob are the only exception.
Agreed. It ain’t Hip hop if it’s well known and blasting in the streets. Side note: Southern Rap
single-handidly pushed Rap and mainstream Black culture onto the path of proud ignorance and unashamed diplays of the social debauchery of the ghetto. Up until the 90s, Black culture and music was mostly about “coming up”. Now it’s odes of pride to baby mamas, hustling, stealing, drugs, and getting over.
Nah, not southern rap; West Coast rap started the decline before Luke and his followers gave it the coup de grace. NWA in the Southland, and a bunch of Tupac wannabees in Norcal. Listen to underground Too Short and Tupac, and you’ll notice the roots.
This is all I have to say to these “hip-hop” types:
Hilarious!
dafuck is “hip-hop”?
Exactly ha
“men who (like women) prioritize status and peer approval over raw physical attraction.”
HOLD ON! Go to the Roosh forums and you have a forum thread that says “Pics of girls we’ve banged.” SAME THING! For crying out loud! SAME THING!
Yep. Loudmouth boys are in every walk of life though. I think the ones in the pickup community have hope. They are not as readily encouraged to brag about their bangs and over time, they good ones get over it.
People tend to forget the red pill and seduction community have a lot of people that ARE NOT GETTING LAID IN THEM lol so sometimes I think people get base and want to prove they are not that and thus their opinion should be respected.
They aren’t quite at the point where they see this isn’t the way ;P
The existence of that thread tells us that there exist men on the forum who value peer approval to some extent.
The existence of that thread does not prove that there exist men on that forum who value status and peer approval OVER raw physical attraction.
You’ve established that there is some value there, but you’ve not established the prioritization claimed in the original statement.
So no, you don’t have the same thing.
nice read Athlone, used to listen to hiphop/rap/whatever you want to call it a lot before, have not taken interest in it at all for 5/6 years now.
You’d be hard pressed before to find the ‘big’ rappers showing on music channels in the daytime due to the content of their lyrics and videos, now the ‘big’ rappers of this age dominate the music channels, because let’s face it, their music is geared towards women who are big spenders in these blurred genre of rnb/rap/hiphop (and nowadays eurodancehiphoprap or whatever pitbull calls it)
“You’d be hard pressed before to find the ‘big’ rappers showing on music channels in the daytime due to the content of their lyrics and videos”
So having obnoxious and coarse lyrics and videos glorifying violence and wanton sexuality is so much better? A sign of high culture indeed. Some sub-cultures should remain in the margins and never be given mainstream cred. Unfortunately hip hop and the degraded ghetto culture it comes from is now mainstream and something that non-ghetto people even aspire to emulate. Pure trash.
not everyone grew up in a gated community your dumb harlot
Once the pols and MSM caught on and started ranting about ‘misogyny’ in rap lyrics, this was inevitable.
The labels figured a way to shut the critics up but keep the gravy train rolling.
That said, back in the day, I recall seeing David Lee Roth, Steve Tyler, and several members of Crue wearing pants like those in the top pic, sans the peeking drawers of course.
As for the rest, ‘[email protected]@er rich’ has been a term since what, the early 70s?
This observation I’ve made since 2007. The only boy who did it right was Jay-Z.
Main Stream Rap homey get it right with you silly Ivy League education, clearly you haven’t been down south or ventured into Yonkers, DeSean Jackson? lol Fck outta here Unless by Hip hop you mean doesn’t scare white people
Can’t tell if this comment is trolling or not, but it is a good illustration of Athlone’s points. An Ivy League education is apparently a strike against you in the hip hop community.
Bingo.
If “bingo” then why listen to it?
i have to admit i went into reading this article with a “who gives a shit about hip hop” attitude because i really dont like the music or anything about the culture that goes along with it, but this was a really great and interesting article. nice work!
I wonder if the reason for going after bad girls isn’t just for social status. Perhaps the guys believe that the crazier the girl, the better they are in the sack?
“bad” means “good” in the context of its use. 🙂
A more feminized hip hop is just a reflection of a more feminized U.S. culture, imo.
Many, if not all, of these trends you mention have been around in hip hop for a LONG time. WAY before social media existed.
Russell Simmons said something along the lines of, “Hip hop is nothing, if not aspirational.” And as far as I know, status jockeying has always been a large part of hip hop. The reasoning for the status jockeying is easy to see if you look at it through the frame of evolutionary psychology.
“Taking yo bitch” and “snagging the bad bitch” is just basic alpha posturing. But you make these rappers out to be insecure try-hards. With pre-selection being what it is, why WOULDN’T they make this information public?
“Shinin” – Rappers have been wearing outrageous jewelry for decades. Look at Rakim or Slick Rick in the 80s. Then check out Ghostface in the 90s.
Beef/Conflict/Competition has long been a part of hip hop. And with so many people having short attention spans, this is used, often transparently, as an attempt to rekindle interest with the general public.
“It isn’t just about getting yours, its about making sure everyone else knows you got yours.”
Again, why wouldn’t they do this? It’s just displaying pre-selection. Pre-selection with girls attracting new girls. Pre-selection with money/success attracting new business opportunities.
I agree with you that hip hop is a shadow of it’s former self. But these “causes” you outlined have been a part of hip hop, dating back to at least the “Golden Era”. It seems a stretch to blame them for hip hop’s current feminization.
Because that is not the true essence of pre-selection. The truest utilization of pre-selection was outlined here by me a few weeks back.
The most effective forms of pre-selection are those that do not require loud, showy presentation. Those forms will attract a steadier stream of higher quality women than any other.
Those men who really have it don’t need to advertise it to the entire world. They simply are, and it shows.
The men playing the show-off game are actually doing it wrong-they’re working to qualify themselves to their women (“look at all my shit, come get at me, leave that other nigga!”), when it should be the other way around (“yeah I have all this stuff-who are you and why should I share it with you?”).
This is try-hard behavior that reveals the deep insecurities I was talking about. Those who are truly on top are not as flashy.
Pre-selection is more effective when less investment is put in on the male end.
Blasting your sexual exploits all over the internet is not as effective as letting girls take discreet word of them through the grapevine. The former way might get you play with some basic bitches in the hoodrat/groupie mold (which, I’ll concede, is a lot of what these rappers are after), but high quality women respond best to more discreet displays of value. That means keeping your mouth shut.
“The most effective forms of pre-selection are those that do not require loud, showy presentation. Those forms will attract a steadier stream of higher quality women than any other.”
Higher quality women?! LOL!!! What would those niggas know about “quality”? I guess the baby mama of 4 kids from 3 different guys is higher quality than the baby mama of 5 kids from 5 different guys.
PSA: video hos ain’t “high quality women”.
This. Right. Here.
Excellent read. I’ve been more than puzzled and perplexed by the young men around me and in every form of media. Being an older black man, I was here before Rap/Hip Hop. I have watched it devolve into something horrid and unrecognizable for years, and I’ve never been able to quite figure out what was driving this odd phenomenon.
Great points. Makes metric tons of sense. Thanks for writing this and provoking thought.
Devolved?
It has always been an anti-white, degenerate form of “art”.
NWA? Too Short? 2 Live Crew?
Completely untrue. NWA and the rest came long after hip hop had fully matured and defined itself as an art form…a process in which whites played an important part (some of the first graffiti artists and breakers were white, this was in the 70’s before hip hop even hit the mainstream). Plus, NWA represented a particularly west coast approach to hip hop, they were always something foreign to the east coast where hip hop got its start.
Most importantly, fast forward a decade after NWA came out and guess what? Former NWA member Dr. Dre took a risk on a then-unknown white rapper named Eminem who under Dre’s tutelage subsequently turned into one of the greatest voices of his generation. Clearly, hip hop is not and has never been anti-white by any stretch of the imagination.
“Former NWA member Dr. Dre took a risk on a then-unknown white rapper named Eminem ”
White trash.
how does it feel that a guy like tupac had more talent in his earlobe than you have in your entire body?
I think many of these rappers are just gay, hence the feminine traits they tend to have. Now I don’t have a problem with homosexuality, but being disingenuous about is very dangerous. Only the truly blind and intellectually immature people are looking to emulate these guys.
Not so much ” gay ” as they are hyper-feminized. Many younger males that have no connection to Hip Hop or Rap also display many feminine traits.
How many times have you been to a mall or the movies, any large gathering, and seen young men who dress and look extremely feminine? The hairstyles, tight clothing….. it’s disheartening.
Yep. Read the book titled “Down Low” to know how brothas go about being teh gay.
Rap Music: The Negro soul revealed for all the world to hear.
And that soul has its share of geniuses who changed the way people all over the world thought about music. I doubt you’ve ever listened to a whole Rakim verse so it’s very likely that your opinion is most uneducated.
Let me guess … you’re one of those whigger ass clowns.
I’ve not the faintest idea of what that means, but most of the music I listen to actually isn’t hip hop…however, anyone who approaches such an artform honestly and objectively can easily see the genius it possesses. Were you to listen to a Rakim verse or contemplate the mechanics of an airflare with an open mind I think you’d agree.
“And that soul has its share of geniuses who changed the way people all over the world thought about music.”
For the worse. Each culture has its own indigenous music forms and musical geniuses. America trash-hop can’t hold a candle to them. As an American export it shames our entire nation as does our porn export. Weapons, porn and trashy music. Those are our number 1 exports. Yep I’m proud to be an American! NOT.
It seems obvious that you’ve never learned anything about hip hop beyond what MTV and BET shoved in your face. It’s not my problem if you can’t be bothered to familiarize yourself with an artform.
The new “Hip-Hop” is bitch. Thank Lil wayne for that bitch shit literally.
I get where the OP is coming from.
Look as Nas, AZ, THE DJ, RIP Guru, will never be forgotten. No matter how old you are, if you know hip hop, you will come to the realization of the skill, and move on. I seen Nas do Illmatic live, with the DJ, and AZ. Never forget it. Wu tang Clan, RIP ODB.
Big Pun, who brought up Big L, and Fat joe who made TS (Terror Squad), which aint even that good. 50 cent in his prime SHIT on TS.
Also got Mobb Deep, BCC (Boot Camp Clik) from the 90’s, Sean Price, I can go on and on……
Personally i like Cam’rons S.D.E, DMX will never be forgotten, no hip hop head will say they dont remember “Ruff ryders anthem” big tune.
Still got Choclair – Lets Ride, light it up. Saukrates has some big tunes but thats toronto shit. Saukrates and K-os, Bias’ed tunes on my part Tdot shit. But if you seen “much” in the 90’s you know what im talking about, when i mention ghetto concept.
Jadakiss and Styles P, Sheek Louch never sold out, they still doing there thing.
But theres still enough real cats out there doing there thing, the game has changed though. Eastcoast check your local rappers, it become your preferred style east orwest, it went from rhymes, punch and verses, to being able to prove every word you speak also.
Can’t legit speak about bodys unless you got one or more, skilled or not. (max b) doing a 75 yr sentence. Thanks to social media talk is cheap.
Mainstream hip-hop is literally BITCH, but if you know where to look, and who to look for……
Nobodys gotta remeber Kanye in XX amount of years, same with enough “rappers/ rhymers”. Whos Clark Gamble? actors arnt remembered, why would they be. Nobody knows who was “acting” in the old ancient roman and greek plays. why would some shitty music artist..
Hip-Hop aint dead… It lives in the North
Rascalz, Kardinal Offishall….
Do you even Death Grips? Stop listening to pleb shit and maybe you won’t have to write such an article.
Rap/hip-hop had an edge to it during the early to mid 90’s. It also had lots of energy. This made it appealing to some of us who normally would not have liked this kind of music. The edginess left it about ’97 or so (about the time 2Pac and BIG were killed) and the energy went away around 2000. The stuff since this time generally sounds the same and is quite boring.
Hip hop ruins otherwise attractive black men for the rest of us.
I dated 2 very physically attractive black men with otherwise likeable personalities but the hip hop ruined them. I can’t respect anyone who’s tastes are so unrefined. And yes, that includes so called “conscious” hip hop as well.
Black men would get more attention from cultured ladies like myself if they dropped that bullshit.
Of course if they are satisfied settling for white trash, then they can keep on keepin’ on.
PS: its not that it has become “neutered” but its been all the things you describe in this article from the get-go. Its a dysfunctional music genre created by dysfunctional people who grew up in a dysfunctional environment. Such dysfunctions should always be shamed and marginalized in any society, not mainstreamed. The problem with hip hop is that it has been mainstreamed so now even functional people patronize the dysfunction.
if I didn’t know it better, I’d be thinking this bitch is trolling
she isn’t
this cunt seriously tells us that society has an obligation to marginalize a genre because she is too tighttwatted to understand them
You’re welcome to your opinion, but I can tell you that there are plenty of quality women who don’t consider respect for Hip-hop or casual following of the genre a dealbreaker.
They don’t like black men who look like walking stereotypes, but one can avoid that and still enjoy some hip-hop.
Well if hip-hop reduces thuggery its good for me.
closed minded cunt thinks that black men care about her existence.
you aren’t worth the gasoline needed to burn your corpse.
good hip hop like technique, doom, electronica, brother ali, 3000, it’s there if you like rap you’ll find it.
Glam Rap = is what you read the here and now no paradigm shift, just ego bass bumping rap.
From Public Enemy saying fight the power, to Jay-Z giving props to Obama; Toochie, Lil B really.
“… just ego bass bumping rap.”-my sentiments exactly
Jazz was the greatest musical contribution of the black community in America. Why it gets over-shadowed by hip-hop I will never understand. Listening to Hip-hop is like watching cartoons, eventually you have to grow up. The most articulate black people I have met in my life were Jazz listeners and musicians. But there are millions of blacks that prefer to accept being the cartoon caricature with the baggy pants and bling. Its like if every Mexican was satisfied being portrayed as Speedy Gonzalez. Or every Indian accepted the style of Apu from the Simpsons.
“…Listening to Hip-hop is like watching cartoons, eventually you have to grow up…”-there it is…KRS 1 stated a loong time ago that if only kids are rapping,then only kids will listen…
no you don’t have to “grow up”
I’m not sure in what conformist backwards country you’re living, but here, many adults watch cartoons and play video games. they don’t let moronic cunts on the internet define for them what “adult” means.
people like broadcast their complete ignorance of all things hip hop. in the past, people were saying the same thing about jazz or rock.
You know why hip-hop / rap sucks today? They don’t scratch anymore. Geez guys, remember your roots.
It seems like hip-hop is merging with pop music; just weird outfits and over-the-top stage performances. Meh. At least I can still listen to Slick Rick.
I repeat this to anyone who will listen…real talk…hip hop began to die when the DJ was phased out…the DJ is the drummer,the backbone,the foundation of hip hop music,NOT the rapper or emcee…let the church say ,Holla(leuia)…
This is apparent in the world of sports as well. Many of the big name athletes are dressing like gay men (or straight up women). Before one of the recent NBA playoff games Dwayne Wade was filmed walking in with flooded skinny jeans, a man purse, and some shoes with glitter on the top…
I thought “peacoking” was a core concept of game. I agree with you that hip hop is being pussified but I don’t see how having the best car or most expensive clothes hurts your manhood. Women are attracted to status and money after all.
Hop hop has become homo hop. lil wayne and baby probably suck each other off in the benz and i wouldn’t be surprised if kanye west took it up the south just like diddy.
Pass the DMX please. (plays where the hood at)
I like old school hip hop and i am a hardcore traditional conservative.
That being said, what passes for hip hop today in general is nothing more than pop culture garbage set to a repeating hook.
On a related note, i question the sexuality of males who wear an earring and question the sexuality as well as the sanity of males who wear earrings on BOTH ears.
Back when i was growing up that was considered nancyboyish…and i’m only in my 30’s.
Fuck Rap.
If you’re hard, sign up for the infantry and go fight overseas.
If you think life in the public subsidized welfare towers is tough, go live in Africa and Asia for a while where the average lifespan is little over 40.
Then come back and tell me life in America is tough.
None of these fucking idiots (or their fans) have me convinced.
Shit “music”, shit genre.
Oddly enough, this is what happened to hair metal in the 80s.