“It’s the Bubbly…”

Hip-Hop Junkie

By Dawn P.

Why do I listen to this music?
I don’t know what made me choose it.
“Turn that noise down,” my mother says,
(she likes the stuff from the good old days).
Why do I listen to music that degrades me,
and uses such profanity?
I know why I love it so much,
I love the rhymes, the phat beats deluxe.
I love everything about it ya see.
the dress, the style it’s all like me.
I hear it, I live it, and I love it;
What more can I say?
I’ll love hip-hop ‘til my dying day.

I used to be a hip-hop junkie. In 1993, when I wrote this poem, I was a 16-year old junior in high school who absolutely loved hip-hop. I was a hip-hop queen. I had every issue of The Source (this was before it got wack), knew all the latest videos and could recite most raps off the top of the dome! I could go into a further debate about how 1993 was during the golden era of hip-hop (early 1990’s with the culmination being 1995…THE best year in hip-hop ever), but I’ll save that for another column about when hip-hop jumped the shark. I could also go on about how I was in love with Pete Rock, but I’ll spare you the details. (But, Pete Rock if you are out there reading…holla at me! I just want a picture…wink, wink).

I entered this poem into a contest promoting the movie, “Poetic Justice”, in the now-defunct Y.E.S. (Youth Excited about Success) magazine and I came in third place. I ran across a copy of the poem while doing some spring cleaning and I read it for the first time in a long time. I thought to myself, what has changed since I first wrote this poem? I argue, not much. There’s one line in particular that stuck out to me:

“Why do I listen to music that degrades me…”

Why is it that 14-years later I am still wondering the same thing? With the Don Imus “controversy” earlier this year leading into a debate about the degradation and misogyny of women in rap music, I really started to think about it more. The Imus response was, “If rappers can say it, why can’t I?” I was offended by such a weak defense at first, but his response at least made me think about the issue in that context.

I can honestly say the link between what Imus said and hip-hop music didn’t really click with me at first–mainly because rap culture has infiltrated mainstream pop culture. Whether we want to admit it or not, there is some validity to the Imus response.

Why is it “okay” for rappers, but more importantly why do we still listen?

Not just listen, but purchase, support, and promote. Do we listen because of the beat and the hook? (I admit to being guilty of that myself.) Do we support certain artists because of our strong sense of loyalty to our own? How else does an accused child pornographer/molester “Kels” go on to sell millions of records and sell out tours? I swear sometimes I wonder about my people. We are either the smartest or we are the dumbest because some of us fall for the okey doke more often than not. My generation falls for the crap that record companies feed us, like mindless drones who just “love the beat”, so we can “back that thang up” on the way to get a grill.

There are deep-rooted historical and (dare I say the “s” word) socio-economic theories why our community behaves this way, but I won’t go into now (I wasn’t an African-American studies major, but I played one on TV right? lol) Some theories exist that suggest there really is so much that we are against that we subconsciously behave in these ways. I’m not making an excuse, but I think there is more psychology going on behind the scenes than we think.

“Why do I listen to music that degrades me…”

As Black women and men, as long as we let ourselves be provoked to be at odds with one another, we’ll never get where we need to go. And disrespecting one another is not the way to get there. Some rappers refer to Black women in such a manner that other races cannot even imagine openly disrespecting their women like that.

B-i-t-c-h. One definition is a female dog. It wasn’t until I got a dog, that I realized that dogs can be nasty little animals. They’re dirty, greedy, they will eat their own waste, regurgitate…ok, you get the point. But, referring to another human on the same level as an animal…think about it, let it sink in…okay, now that’s pretty low, huh?

H-o. Yeah, leave the “e” off, we’re not talking about the garden tool (that was for all the “House Party” fans out there lol). “Ho” is short for “whore” or a woman that prostitutes herself. Last time I checked, I get up every morning and go to work (don’t worry about what time, that’s “nonyabusiness” heehee), and although I may sit on my butt all day, there is no “booty poppin” involved in order to get my paycheck from Uncle Sam. And no, “Uncle Sam” is not a pimp…well that’s debatable to some, I suppose.

OK, OK, so these rappers aren’t talking about all women, right? Just “some”…you know the “hood rats”. Sounds like yet another sorry justification that just won’t fly. Maybe the women that rappers characterize in that way “act” like that because that is all that they have been exposed to. But, that still doesn’t make it right and I would pray for something better for those sisters. Pray that they realize their value and that they are not continually put down, which just keeps the cycle going.

I come from a lineage of women that would fit neither of those definitions. I’m talking about the women that held their men down, held the family down, raised the kids, worked in the fields, all of that. By no stretch of the imagination were there any female dogs or whores. They did what they had to do, making sacrifices so that the next generation would have a better life.

To see where we are 14 years after my poem—the status of the Black male/female relationship and the status of the music that we are letting our kids listen to–it’s slightly disheartening, to say the least, that we have not made much progress. I am forever the optimist though and it may take some time. But the way I see it, if we’ve already hit “rock bottom” with the disrespect of women in hip-hop, the only place to go is up.

One day I will get my beloved music back, so I can go back to being a hip-hop junkie.

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