For hip-hop fans who relish a good debate, the last few weeks have been a gift horse.
On Sept. 25, hip-hop went to Washington. At a congressional hearing titled "From Imus to Industry: The Business of Stereotypes and Degradation," spearheaded by Rep. (and former Black Panther) Bobby L. Rush (D-Ill.), speakers included Viacom Chief Executive Philippe Dauman, Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr. and rappers Master P and David Banner.
That same day, a hyperbolically titled, three-part series premiered on BET: "Hip-Hop vs. America," a town hall-style event at which a host of rappers (Nelly and T.I.), talking heads (columnist Stanley Crouch and Georgetown professor Michael Eric Dyson) and activists (writer Kevin Powell) flexed their intellectual muscles while bickering about hip-hop, the N-word, misogyny and the like.
Things grew almost as heated as they did this year when, at Oprah Winfrey's first show devoted to hip-hop, Warner's Executive Vice President Kevin Liles took umbrage at Crouch's term for members of the hip-hop community ("clowns").
The last time hip-hop was enmeshed in such hullabaloo was during the gangsta-rap era, when feminist activist C. DeLores Tucker cited Snoop Dogg lyrics on the floor of Congress. In fact, the discourse hasn't evolved much since: Detractors are still blaming rap music for violence and misogyny, and defenders are still asserting that violence and misogyny didn't start with rap music -- they're as American as apple pie. Fans, meanwhile, protest that hip-hop is a handy scapegoat for wider social ills. So, should we feel sorry for the beleaguered genre?
Hardly. A key difference is that in the mid-'90s, hip-hop was comfortably selling records; nowadays, album sales are down -- by more than 30% since 2000, according to the Recording Industry Assn. of America. That's faster than the beleaguered record industry in general, which is off about 20% over the same period. So it's not just ironic that hip-hop is being censured and dissected at the very moment when the genre has become most commercially immaterial -- its public critique might be the best thing rap has going for it.
Worse than being attacked, after all, is being ignored. If rappers can't sell the way they once did, nothing makes them feel as if they matter more than being at the crux of controversy.
