First Published: 31 January 2006
This was not always the case. 50 Cent, along with his characteristic supplications to expensive and excessive jewelry, vehicles, and women, was not always hip-hop’s ambassador. Indeed, that genre, now considered popular, was once a radical social movement that aimed to advance human causes through a lyrical art form that expressed vividly the absence of and need for social justice in impoverished societal ghettos.
Is it possible that recent times have seen the marginalised’s plight sufficiently ameliorated so as to outmode the importance of social messages in contemporary hip-hop? Does the marginalization of the social tirades of Mos Def and Common Sense in favour of the egoistic entreaties of Nelly and Fiddy gesture to a victory for capitalism? Even more perilously, has society become increasingly enchanted with the pursuit of indulgence so as to nourish its expression? Considering modern hip-hop’s pervasiveness, the answer to this most critical question seems to be in the affirmative.
What is perhaps the most damaging consequence of modern hip-hop’s celebration of indulgence is its depiction of women. Typically under-clad and over-sexed, women are paralleled with icons of materialist culture and thus are objectified alongside Maybachs and Pumas. Although many musical forms have displayed misogynistic and exploitative tendencies, such as rock, it is the commercial strength of hip-hop’s contemporary modishness that propels its perceptions of women to the fore. Modern hip-hop’s much-touted hyper-masculinity inspires in the popular consciousness a normative that effectively reduces half the human population to little more than currency.
Just consider the generally accepted practise of nightclub promoters and doormen who openly solicit women as marketing tools by offering them free liquor or admission in order to entice male patrons. (Imagine the uproar if men were treated preferentially!) What such practises expose is the implicit endorsement and active sustenance of blatant violations of equality rights and gender discrimination laws. One recalls here, amidst the indignant assertions of women claiming sexual independence, Wollstonecraft’s championing of women’s rationality versus subjugation justified by the ‘arbitrary power of beauty’, in which women themselves are complicit. Evincing this is Destiny Child’s callipygous panegyric, ‘Bootylicious’.
What all this speaks of is a society willfully excited by indulgence, composed of compliant victims of a consumerist culture supported by a vicious capitalism that thrives on an ethic of individualism. This is illustrated by a popular culture (and a marketing machine) that fosters the irresponsible addiction to a hedonistic consumerism in which women are the most prized commodity. Of what use, then, are civic appeals to common citizenship when the popular consciousness is permeated with a perception that effectively dehumanises half the population? As long as such perceptions persist, the civic dream of human equality will remain a distantEden
Despite the many options available to contemporary music listeners, the popular palette is sated most often by the likes of Eminem’s bizarre invectives or Mariah’s tintinnabular pleadings. Hip-hop’s overwhelming dominance of contemporary popular culture is evinced by the monolithic play-lists of radio conglomerates like Standard Radio, as well as the billion-dollar hip-hop clothing industry, which a Statistics Canada study hails as retail clothing’s champion. It is that intense consumerism, coupled with the tangible egoism of hip-hop entertainers, which typifies modern hip-hop music and its attendant culture.
What sustains such vigorous consumerism, though, is the rigorous pursuit of indulgence. Perhaps the most iniquitous aspect of that pursuit, which exemplifies well the hip-hop industry, is the exploitative objectification of women. Considering that both the producers and consumers of the hip-hop industry deliberately promote and stoke the denigration of women, what is underscored here is a general unpreparedness in society for real social and human equality.
This was not always the case. 50 Cent, along with his characteristic supplications to expensive and excessive jewelry, vehicles, and women, was not always hip-hop’s ambassador. Indeed, that genre, now considered popular, was once a radical social movement that aimed to advance human causes through a lyrical art form that expressed vividly the absence of and need for social justice in impoverished societal ghettos.
Is it possible that recent times have seen the marginalised’s plight sufficiently ameliorated so as to outmode the importance of social messages in contemporary hip-hop? Does the marginalization of the social tirades of Mos Def and Common Sense in favour of the egoistic entreaties of Nelly and Fiddy gesture to a victory for capitalism? Even more perilously, has society become increasingly enchanted with the pursuit of indulgence so as to nourish its expression? Considering modern hip-hop’s pervasiveness, the answer to this most critical question seems to be in the affirmative.
What is perhaps the most damaging consequence of modern hip-hop’s celebration of indulgence is its depiction of women. Typically under-clad and over-sexed, women are paralleled with icons of materialist culture and thus are objectified alongside Maybachs and Pumas. Although many musical forms have displayed misogynistic and exploitative tendencies, such as rock, it is the commercial strength of hip-hop’s contemporary modishness that propels its perceptions of women to the fore. Modern hip-hop’s much-touted hyper-masculinity inspires in the popular consciousness a normative that effectively reduces half the human population to little more than currency.
Just consider the generally accepted practise of nightclub promoters and doormen who openly solicit women as marketing tools by offering them free liquor or admission in order to entice male patrons. (Imagine the uproar if men were treated preferentially!) What such practises expose is the implicit endorsement and active sustenance of blatant violations of equality rights and gender discrimination laws. One recalls here, amidst the indignant assertions of women claiming sexual independence, Wollstonecraft’s championing of women’s rationality versus subjugation justified by the ‘arbitrary power of beauty’, in which women themselves are complicit. Evincing this is Destiny Child’s callipygous panegyric, ‘Bootylicious’.
What all this speaks of is a society willfully excited by indulgence, composed of compliant victims of a consumerist culture supported by a vicious capitalism that thrives on an ethic of individualism. This is illustrated by a popular culture (and a marketing machine) that fosters the irresponsible addiction to a hedonistic consumerism in which women are the most prized commodity. Of what use, then, are civic appeals to common citizenship when the popular consciousness is permeated with a perception that effectively dehumanises half the population? As long as such perceptions persist, the civic dream of human equality will remain a distant
