She's a rapper

Fuck you Hip Hop

It’s the year 2016, as a kid I believed that by 2010 I would be racing through the Maccas drive thru in a shmick custom built personal rocket.

It was all that millennium bug hype that tipped me to that point, I swear. 

What I didn’t think I'd have to battle with was an influential industry, a social movement, an art of the soul and how this art continues to vehemently objectify women. Fuck you hip-hop.

Misogyny has become a sign of authenticity for some rappers, who use misogynistic lyrics and objectifying images of women ‘shakin that ass’ to prove that they are authentic gangsters. Extreme sexism and virulent homophobia is the trending persona for rappers, without it we would question their masculinity, wouldn’t we? 

What would happen if you guys started to distance yourselves from hyper masculine self-portrayals and hostile, sexist representations of women? And don’t even get me started on homophobia.

The narrative of negative female stereotypes deserves to be discarded. This narrative pertains to the idea that a woman is viewed primarily as an object of male sexual desire, rather than as a whole person.

Since its inception, rap music has evolved from an underground subcultural movement to a mainstream subcultural expression that profits from the ideology of dominant culture and vice versa. This reciprocal relationship between hip hop and dominant culture ideologies have also partaken in the glorification, justification and normalization of the objectification, exploitation, and victimization of women. Ok a slight generalization and highly verbose……but I’m angry. 

In a capitalist world commercial success is at the fore and sex sells. Sexy women sell, because capitalism is entrenched in patriarchy, actually they work hand in hand. And there is this seemingly widespread uneducated view of Feminism where it is equated to a meager grouping of ovulating women on the steps of Parliament House raising placards that say, “I hate dick”.

Hip Hop has become more known for its obsession with wealth and glamour and unadulterated objectification of women than for its social-commentary roots. We rap about freedom, about sticking it to the institutions, about social and political revolutions yet we also oddly perpetuate a culture where social change is subtly crushed by how we continue to portray women.

Fuck you Hip Hop. Fuck all your bitches and hoes.