Saturday, November 12, 2005

Derrick Jackson unloads on gangsta rap.

Derrick Jackson and I have very little in common. On most issues I find myself vehemently disagreeing with this reflexes.

But we apparently agree on the corporate exploitation of young black males by corporate America. The hip hop industry is a con. I laugh everytime Rebbock throws out its human rights awards. The corporation is a study in object hypocrisy.


It is tragic enough that black rappers and hip-hop moguls prostitute themselves to the Fortune 500 with the very stereotypes about violence, stupidity, and sexual drive that white society used to justify slavery, colonization, segregation, and lynching. After slave rebellions, the Underground Railroad, patriotism in world wars, marches on Washington, and murders of civil rights workers, Jay-Z makes millions saying, ''I take and rape villages."

African-Americans can no longer afford to coddle these people. The black czars of gutter hip-hop are the new house slaves. And Reebok's promotion of this material, along with Comcast and other media giants, is just as reprehensible.

In his second-quarter 2005 conference call, Reebok CEO Paul Fireman said that Jay-Z has ''been a great assistance in connecting us to the right people culturally, connecting us, working with athletes . . . Jay-Z is an inspirational person in that community."

Moguls like Jay-Z may be wearing pinstripes these days and Russell Simmons may be urging youth of color to vote, but as long as their foundation is rotten, they are a corrosive force in black culture. If the civil rights establishment is looking for a new crusade, it needs to summon the guts to ignore the billions that flow through the hip-hop industry. At the close of 2004 all top-10 rap singles ranked by Billboard used
the ''n" word in their uncensored versions.


Read the whole column.

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