This week I attended a Town Hall meeting on the campus of Case Western Reserve University. Hip Hop writers and pundits were in attendance and the discussion centered around misogyny and the Don Imus debacle. Bakari Kitwana moderated and the guests on the panel were writers, Tracy Sharpley-Whiting, Joan Morgan and Dr. Mark Anthony Neal.
If you know anything about colors, you know that there are many shades of blue, but that they are still all shades of blue. And the same could be said for these panelists, they were all Hip Hop advocates and as such, they held the same opinion about the culture which has a stranglehold over American black youth and white youth.
I realized what a waste of time it was to be in the company of these learned scholars who all make a nice piece of change as Hip Hop cheerleaders. While discussing the Don Imus situation it became clear that talk show diva Oprah Winfrey had no right to hold her own town hall meeting to discuss the nations' reaction to shock jock Don Imus' racist and sexist remarks. Seems according to Dr. Neal, Oprah doesn't have the right to discuss the problems with Hip Hop. It was Neal who also said that writer, Jason Whitlock of the Kansas City Star hated Hip Hop and therefore had no right to give his opinions. He described Whitlock as a hater of black people as well.
And it struck me, these writers hate anyone who doesn't love Hip Hop. How in the hell can you have a dialougue when everyone is saying the same thing? Or when people who disagree are marginalized for their opinion? So Whitlock and Winfrey who are both black are not allowed to make their comments on the situation or the problems with the music.
Yes there are problems with the ideology of Hip Hop. When Bakari Kitwana broke out the four pillars of Hip Hop, it started to become clear that this is a religion, a cult-ture. A cult has its own beliefs, vestments, music, idols, etc. And such is the case with Hip Hop and there lies the problem. None of the people who love the music realize that it is like a cult. Or that they are under the spell of this cult.
So here's how I know. The discussion centered around the negative stereotypes of women by men in Hip Hop. None of the panelists disagreed that there is a problem. They even gave us the history of slavery and the treatment of black women in this nation, but no one would go so far as to say that there was a connection between Hip Hop and the treatment of women in the black community. And remember, there were women on the panel. I thought this was odd that there was no discourse on this matter. In fact, most panelists suggested that we write the FCC or that stations should play offensive material after 11 pm. Well, let's keep cussing, we'll just do it after 11 pm. What a useless suggestion.
Another example of the uselessness of this forum: One young activist, forgive me, I forgot her name because she wasn't memorable as a speaker, she said that it was difficult to get young people to get involved at a grassroots level. She gave the example of a recent election where she tried to enlist young people in an action to get out the vote.
Having not partaken of this Hip Hop elixir, I realized immediately that young people are not socialized to participate in their civic duties. They are encouraged to be pimps, thugs and whores. You can't possibly expect these kids to want to vote, none of their idols do. That's when it became crystal clear, these people are so brainwashed that they don't realize what they're saying--and it's made more evident by the lack of response from the audience that they don't realize they are participants in a cult either.
Then a brother in a Green Bay Packers jersey stepped up to the microphone and promptly dropped the following: "Hip Hop is satanic and demonic."
No one on the panel opened their mouth. That's the power of truth.
I left this town hall mess realizing that Hip Hop plays a large role in the decline of the black community. Never have I witnessed a genre of music that required activists and advocates. The truth doesn't require advocates or activists. So there is a problem with Hip Hop. The fact no dissenters to the music or its rhetoric is allowed speaks to the bondage of the music. Why can't people who don't like it voice their opinions?
Well, someone might hear the truth and then tell someone else and so on and so on. Here's my final thought: On behalf of all the blacks who died during the Middle Passage, for those who labored as slaves for free, had their children yanked from their arms, for those who were whipped, for those who were branded and forced to stand naked on an auction block; for those who risked their lives as runaway slaves only to be caught and murdered, for those who were lynched, burned and then castrated, and for those women who were repeatedly raped, y'all need to cut this bull crap out.
God pre-destined us to live in America, to escape the witchcraft and Voodun of Africa so that we could be his people and that he could be our God and dwell among us. The cult of Hip Hop places a wedge between us and God because of its dark origins and idolatrous leanings. For all you kids out there who are hooked, listen to classical music for a month and get yourself to a church where the word of God is preached. It will take time perhaps, but you can be set free from Hip Hop because there's no life in it. Your destiny and purpose on this Earth is real and you need to be free in order to receive it.
2 comments:
By the way I didn't say that Jason Whitlock hated black people, I said that he (and Stanley Crouch) hated "black youth".
Also, regarding Oprah, the larger point was that hip-hop seems to be the only current cultural formation where one doesn't have to know anything about it and be viewed as a credible critic. Yes, everybody has a right to an opinion, but not all opinions are well informed.
Finally, if you read the work of Kitwana, Sharpley-Whiting, Morgan and myself (that would be about 12 books between us) you'd find that we`disagree on quite a few things.
The fact that you even found this no name blog and responded to it is funny. The Hip Hop gods make sure that you know when your name is used in a blog or the topic of the culture is questioned.
I'm glad you straightened out the quote on Jason and Stanley Crouch. They don't hate black youth, more than likely they hate what black youth have become and been deceived into not becoming. And there are millions of us who feel the same way. Hip Hop activists and advocates, writers, etc., don't want to hear from us. We are marginalized and that's your right. And here's something else, you don't have to be that informed to know that there is a connection between the decline of the black community and Hip Hop. And I wouldn't expect you to admit such a connection.
People like Oprah Winfrey do us a favor by not bringing these "artists" on her program. She has the right not to promote it and there are millions of us who applaud her for not doing so. See we live in the neighborhoods where the mindset of Hip Hop is visible. We are made prisoners of our homes because of it. Our corners are peopled with the drooped giant pants wearers, they walk in the middle of the street and defy cars to hit them because their Hip Hop Cult-ure doesn't speak life, but death into their lives.
So many millions of Americans want to see something better for our neighborhoods. We want to exert influence through our criticism that we as a people have overcome much since coming to this land, and we must overcome Hip Hop's negative mindsets. We shall overcome and we shall not die but live and testify to the works of the Lord--that being, that we will not serve false idols who speak death into the lives of our children. Those children have been given dreams and visions, none of which will be released because of their worship of Hip Hop.
Now they can rap, dance and make art, but not from that root of darkness. How do we know the root is darkness? Because you can tell every tree by its fruit. If you fill a bottle with piss, it's piss filled.
Lastly, someone wants me to remind all of you that there were no R&B activists, or jazz activists. We don't understand why there is a need for Hip Hop activism when the black community will begin to prosper when those mindsets of Hip Hop are dealt with by teaching our youth that they have a destiny and purpose, that they may be poor today, but they have access to the King of King and Lord of Lords if they receive Him. They will never achieve the greatness they were birthed for until they do. So we will continue to speak life where Hip Hop has not. Get rich or die trying; no, get free and start prophesying.
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