“Think it is when it ain’t all peaches and cream/That’s why some are
found floating face down in the mainstream.” –OutKast (Excerpt from
the song, “Mainstream” off the album, ATLiens)
Over a decade ago, Hip-Hop theologians OutKast used their southern-fried flow to send an impassioned plea on their
seminal track, “Mainstream:” Don’t let a little bling blind your
perspective. The prophetic duo – with assistance from play cousins
Goodie Mob – exposed the trappings of fame, government corruption, and
AIDS via a cautionary rap verse. They knew then what many are
discovering now – Hip-Hop’s mainstream coronation would be a welcomed
blessing and unforeseen curse. Hip-Hop, like many other Black cultural productions
post-Middle Passage, has been compromised by cultural pimps (record
labels, media conglomerates, corporations, etc.) seeking to censor its
revolutionary elements while green-lighting destructive buffoonery and
giving credence to long-standing stereotypes of Black life.
Consequently, artists of substance like Dead Prez, Jean Grae, and
Little Brother rarely make radio play-lists. Little girls dream of
being video vixens instead of spinnin’ soft Black songs like Nikki Giovanni. And
while outlets discuss whether Hip-Hop is art or social poison, the
larger question we must ask is how white supremacy and market forces
have altered the perception of a grass roots movement. Hip-Hop has sadly become a convenient scapegoat for
historical inequalities that deeply alter our quality of life. Art
ain’t created in a vacuum, and Hip-Hop was originally birthed as an
underground anecdote to the psychological trauma of poverty, racism and
a range of human sufferings that flow through them. Trouble in Hip-Hop
paradise began when artists abandoned the tenets that once defined
Black existence (solidarity, social activism, etc.) and began to mimic
the values of a corporate system founded on greed, capitalism and
individuality.
This abandonment of social conscious is aided by market forces and
label heads who care more about profits than prophets and offer
million-dollar deals to studio gangstas and anyone willing to drop
nonsense over hot beats. Today’s Hip-Hop artists are a small cog in a
well-oiled corporate machine that has always used Black sweat,
toil and cultural production (remember slavery) to serve its seedy
economic interests. So, panel discussions like the one that took place
on The Oprah Show (April 18) are great for TV ratings, but miss the
mark when accountability is solely placed on vulnerable people without
power – power that dictates our economy and distributes wealth. In
other words, if we convict the rapper, we must convict parents who
dropped the ball, elders who turned their backs on the impoverished,
corporate pimps who pray for our demise, so called “Black” spokesmen
padding their pockets at our expense, and a system of commerce that
never gave a damn about Black folks in the first place.
The plight of Black folks is bound to escape the limited confines of
many talk radio and lunch room venting sessions. And Hip-Hop, like
Black life in general, is wrought with pain and struggle. Art reflects
the people and if we want Hip-Hop to change, we have to love ourselves
enough to change. Record deals don’t change people, they only give folks a greater platform to be the fools or social activists they already were.
Edward M. Garnes Jr. is an Atlanta based award-winning writer,
activist, and educator who holds a M.A. in Counseling from Michigan
State University. Garnes is the founder of From Afros to Shelltoes and
can be reached at ed@afrostoshelltoes.com.
The
views expressed inside this editorial aren’t necessarily the views of AllHipHop.com
or its employees.
