A Quote by Bakari Kitwana
Unfortunately there is a standard set for it that precedes hip-hop. It would be great if corporate America didn't do this, but there is a huge market for sex and violence and anti-Black representations in America and the world that doesn't begin or end with hip-hop.
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Somewhere down the line, the evil ones stole the legacy of hip hop and flipped it to a corporate type of hip hop. They decided to tell everybody 'Well, this is what hip hop is,' instead of coming back to the pioneers and getting the true definition of what hip hop is and what it was and what we been pushing for all these years.
After many years of hip-hop as a nation we should have the sophistication to accept that their are distinctions between the corporate manifestation of hip-hop, sold as a commodity and package with sensational race, sex and violent imagery, and the hip-hop culture that kids are living everyday at a local level, which often doesn't dabble in that terrain.
I think hip hop is dead. It's all pop now. If you call it hip hop, then you need to stop. Hip hop was a movement. Hip hop was a culture. Hip hop was a way of life. It's all commercial now.
Hip-hop is contributing to American society's misogyny and racism, hyper-sexuality anti-Black representations. Hip-Hop isn't setting the standard for misogyny. No one reduces the presidency to misogyny, although we've had misogynistic presidents. No one reduces our government to being solely homophobic, although we have a government with a don't ask, don't tell policy for gays and lesbians in the military.
Hip is to know, it's a form of intelligence. To be hip is to be update and relevant. Hop is a form of movement, you can't just observe a hop, you gotta hop up and do it. Hip and hop is more than music
Hip is the Knowledge, hop is the Movement. Hip and Hop is Intelligent movement
I wake up hip-hop,
Go to sleep hip-hop,
Dream 'bout hip-hop,
'Cause I AM HIP-HOP.
Hip-Hop is diverse. But the white, capitalist producers and distributors of Hip-Hop are most interested in the Hip-Hip that is misogynist, that is Black-hating, that is pugilistic, that is to say all about fighting and war and killing and gangsterism.
The question 'Why white kids love hip-hop?' forces us immediately to deal with the historical weight of race in America. On the surface people see hip-hop and race as nothing new. I think the ways young white Americans are engaging hip-hop suggest something more.
We need to look beyond the obvious. Yes, there are minstrel images in hip-hop. Yes, there are demeaning, anti-racist, misogynistic and homophobic representations. We could make the same case about the church and our government. But hip-hop, like society, isn't one dimensional.
This is the thing about hip-hop music and where people get it most misconstrued: It's all hip-hop. You can't say that just what I do is hip-hop, because hip-hop is all energies. James Brown can get on the track and mumble all day. But guess what? You felt his soul on those records.
Hip-hop is limiting itself and that also goes for editorially. Magazines and websites are the gatekeepers of what people think hip-hop is, but they actually end up limiting what hip-hop can be.
Pitbull is great with brands. Endorsements with hip-hop artists work because hip-hop artists typically set the most trends... It's every brand's goal to be seen in the mainstream, and hip-hop music has become mainstream music.
I was a hip-hop head. When I really found my own lane in music, it was hip-hop. I wanted to make hip-hop music. And I did, I made a lot of hip-hop music.
Socially, hip-hop has done more for racial camaraderie in this country than any one thing. 'Cause guys like me, my kids - everyone under 45 either grew up loving hip-hop or hating hip-hop, but everyone under 45 grew up very aware of hip-hop. So when you're a white kid and you're listening to this music and you're being exposed to it every day on MTV, black people become less frightening. This is just a reality. What hip-hop has done bringing people together is enormous.
While a lot of hip-hop was inspired by jazz or James Brown samples and was made to be played live in the clubs, I made hip-hop that was made for MCs to eat the mic up. It was an aggressive form of hip-hop. It was made just for hip-hop. It's not made to sing or dance to, though you can if you want.
I guess the difference between the Korean hip-hop scene and the American hip-hop scene is that in the American hip-hop scene, you know, they have their Jay-Zs. They can become conglomerates through hip-hop. In Korea, it doesn't happen.
