Rapper Chief Keef tweets misogynistic lyric on heels of Rick Ross controversy: Is hip-hop hopeless?

OPINION - I am supposed to pen a witty editorial, calling for the reform of rap, or some such. But I have officially long since given up on eradicating hip-hop's misogyny...

Luther Vandross was outed as gay after his death.

When corporate sponsor Reebok finally bowed to pressure from pissed off listeners and fired pro-rape spokesperson Rick Ross last week, and then Rick Ross apologized, seeming one thousand editorials were launched advocating for reform in hip-hop. Reebok’s stance gave some hope that rappers regularly could be held accountable for their lyrics, that with enough protesting, petitioning and calling out, a change would come.

Reebok was right to let Ross go. Ross was right to issue a real apology. But is change coming like a Sam Cooke hook? Please.

Need proof? On the heels of this debacle, 17-year-old Chicago rapper Chief Keef tweeted yet another misogynistic lyric, ostensibly taking advantage of Ross’ controversy to promote a new single.

I am supposed to pen a witty editorial, calling for reform, demanding the time is now, or some such. But I have officially long since given up on hip-hop.

The tattered history of hip-hop reform

I feel like I’m not supposed to say that. At the very least, I should be drawing some proverbial line in the sand, adding to a heap of essays calling for the end of the degradation of women, how it’s unacceptable and how we must hold rappers accountable and blah, blah, blah. I should… but I’m out of steam. I lack effort. And patience. I’m throwing in the towel. It’s not because I’m lazy or don’t think any of that should happen. I just think it’s an effort in vain. I’ve given up on changing what’s wrong with hip-hop.

I’ve been a fan of hip-hop for about 20 years. I was a kid in 1990 when 2 Live Crew’s As Nasty As They Wanna Be was declared “legally obscene” and banned in parts of Florida… and then that ruling was overturned. The lyrics didn’t change. At all. And to be clear, I’m don’t support censorship, but do advocate having a conscience, which few rappers, then or now, seem to have.

A few years later, Snoop dropped Doggystyle, which featured as its cover art a cartoon of a literal female dog, face-down, bottom up — doggy style, in case you missed it. The in-your-face degradation of women couldn’t be overlooked. I remember how women’s rights activist C. Delores Tucker protested that album, and others. Tupac responded by calling her a “bitch” and a “motherf***er.”

Around that time, Reverend Calvin O. Butts of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church rented a steam roller and threatened to well, roll over discs with offensive music. He settled for dumping the CDs on the doorstep of Sony Music. There was plenty of conversation about change, but no action.

Giving up on the genre I loved

In the intervening years between the mid ’90s and the early ’00s, I was coming of age as an adult. I’m sure there were vocal protests then too, but I was too “busy” dancing to misogynistic lyrics with hot beats to care. I’d taken more of a Chris Rock approach, the one he infamously chided women about in an HBO stand up routine — “he ain’t talkin’ about me.”

My sensitivity meter clicked back on when I finally felt something like a grown-up. Perhaps I’d been street harassed one too many times, called out my name for the simple offense of not wanting to stop to talk to a strange man who was yelling from his car or down the block.

By then, a group of ladies at Spelman were rallying against a Nelly video in which he swipes a credit card through the crevice of a woman’s posterior, and Don Imus was blaming his infamously ignorant, racist and misogynistic comments on hip-hop. Somehow the lyrics of that music genre became the focus of his erroneous judgement. Either way, a panel of rappers and music executives landed on The Oprah Winfrey Show for a controversial two-part series about what’s wrong with hip-hop and how it can be fixed. The result was hip-hop’s elder statesman Russell Simmons’ recommendation that artists and their labels voluntarily remove “bitch,”  “ho,” and the n-word from their songs. Clearly, that didn’t happen either.

Turning my back on the Rap Industry Machine

After all that fuss over the last two decades, nothing’s changed. In fact, some of the lyrics are worse than ever. Fast-forward to present day in which 2 Chainz is soliciting “big booty hos” for his birthday, Lil Wayne equates sex with a woman to the brutal and historic murder of Emmett Till, and Rick Ross raps about rape. I give up.

The Rap Industry Machine and all the misogyny, degradation, and self-hate its most popular artists spew is here to stay. I approach it with a stance akin to the advice of the Serenity Prayer, in which I accept the things I cannot change, and try to change the things I cannot accept.

At this point with hip-hop, I have the wisdom to know the difference.

As a life coach, I spend my efforts trying to build self-esteem in the women and men affected by this music (and other factors). I listen to edited versions of popular songs on my iPhone, I actively shield children in my presence from hearing the worst of it, and I simply ignore what I don’t like.

I don’t know what else to do.

Demetria L. Lucas is the author of “A Belle in Brooklyn: The Go-to Girl for Advice on Living Your Best Single Life” (Atria), in stores now. Follow her on Twitter @abelleinbk.

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