It is no secret that we black folk have problems…big problems and lots of them.  But is hip-hop music really one of them?  None of us are proud of the rate at which we as a group commit violent crimes, get incarcerated, fail to achieve academically, abuse illegal substances or see our teens become pregnant.  These problems have never been a secret, especially to us, but they have never been more visible to others.  Of course, in the information age, everything is more visible to everyone.  Twenty-four hour news channels have plenty of airtime to fill and the negative side of the African-American experience gets at least its share of the coverage.  Further, African-Americans are becoming more willing to discuss our issues “outside the family.”  One of our most prominent entertainers Bill Cosby has apparently retired from the entertainment business to tour the country putting African-Americans and our self-destructive behavior “on blast.”  Despite Mr. Cosby’s good intentions, his message has not always been greeted warmly.  No one likes to look too closely his or her flaws.  There is no question that our “stuff” is out there in the open. 

So apparently, it is not difficult to for many to believe that we blacks are more susceptible to the negative influence of entertainment media than are our white counterparts.   It has been argued even among blacks that the choices that black teenagers make are governed by the “hip-hop heroes” they witness living opulent, enviable life styles.  As the argument goes, we must fight this influence by battling the rap industry to be more responsible in their messaging.  However, millions of white teens see the same glamorization of criminal behavior on The Sopranos and in hip-hop music and culture (white teens love Biggie too), but no one seems to feel that these influences preclude this teen from getting an education, staying out of prison and contributing to society in a positive way.  The inference here is that black teens are just ignorant enough to set their moral compasses, not by the positive influences that may be present in their own homes, families, churches or communities, but the negative influences provided by entertainers.   Are we ready to accept that characterization?  Is the answer that easy?  Are we that pitiful?   

There is one inescapable fact that the “hip-hop problem” discussions and all of the “scapegoat studies” avoid.  Despite our best efforts, we cannot build an environment sanitized to the point that it guarantees the success of its inhabitants.  We will all be faced with undesirable situations and we will be forced to take action and make choices based upon the environment with which we are presented.  In life, two people can experience the same stimuli and have completely different reactions.  Oprah Winfrey turned childhood sexual abuse into the motivation to become one of the most successful business people in the America’s history.  Conversely, many would-be violent criminals turned childhood sexual abuse into the foundation from which they became violent.  Life can be terribly unfair, but we still get to help determine its outcome.  Individuals make choices.  Some turn tragedy into triumph while others turn tragedy into more tragedy.  Regardless of circumstance, the outcomes of our lives ultimately depend on the action we take above all else.

Similarly, different individuals experience hip-hop music and culture and have different reactions.  We cannot predict any music will effect anyone well enough to draw simple cause-and-effect solutions.  Many people hear hip-hop music and see hope, encouragement, passion and a reason to achieve.  Hip-hop music and culture has spawned business titans that sell its music and other products and teach others to strive for similar success.  Hip-hop has served as a positive choice for countless individuals, individuals who chose to make music rather than make mischief.  Some will hear hip-hop as a beats, rhymes and unintelligible lyrics.  Others will hear it and take it as entertainment and even positive inspiration.  Some outlying individuals may hear hip-hop and be inspired to develop a plan for mayhem.  Do we really believe that these people would have chosen the church choir over the streets were it not for hip-hop?  Ultimately, hip-hop does not define the mission of the individual, but instead the individual defines the mission of hip-hop in his or her life.

The point that “scapegoat studies” miss is that people make choices for which the world will hold them responsible regardless.  The “hip-hop-made-me-do-it” defensive will not reverse court decisions or biological laws.  So if we want to solve problems, we need to seek answers, not excuses.  Goodness knows that we have plenty of problems that need solving.  How do we curb violent crime, misogyny, the destruction of the family unit?  These are the real questions, not how do we “stop hip-hop” or exonerate it.  Hip-hop artists are not developing their ideas in political think-tanks.  They are singing what they know, what they see.   If life experience drives musical content and we are displeased with the content, the better question to address is how we can change the experience of the artists who eventually make the music?  We must address the problem, not the symptom.  The longer we foolishly seek a Utopia, in which our young people’s minds are shielded from reality, the work we do preparing them for that reality or creating a better one.  No matter how damning the case appears against hip-hop, a song has never pulled a trigger nor committed a sex act. 

Perhaps Bakari Kitwana made the most profound statement on the subject included in this New York Times article.  This should be no surprise, as Kitwana is the author of “The Hip-Hop Generation,” seen by many as the definitive book about hip-hop culture.  Mr. Kitwana said. “Hip-hop is a generational phenomenon that has united young people.  If that’s not understood, you’re going to miss a lot.”  Rather than attempt to diminish the power of hip-hop, perhaps we should try to understand, as Mr. Kitwana suggests, the minds of our young people.  This understanding will help us all develop powerfully positive messages that speak more effectively to them.  If our country is ablaze in an inferno of moral decay, hip-hop is not the wildfire, but some of its attendant billowy smoke.  Let’s fight the real fire.  Until we do, we will continue to miss the real point.  

Mainstream media has repeatedly suggested that hip-hop music and culture contributes to, if not directly causes, a myriad of social ills including violent crime, misogyny, low interest in education and anti-social behavior.  Hip-hop, the most studied musical genre in the history of musical genres, was again under the microscope in the November 6, 2007 New York Times article entitled “For Clues on Teenage Sex, Experts Look to Hip-Hop.”   No one would suggest that we as a society should not try to learn how teens make decisions regarding when and how they engage in sexual activity with the purpose of helping them make better decisions.   However, the framing of the question itself yet again misses the real point to be discussed.  Discussions that begin with the presumption that hip-hop is the problem to be solved, “scapegoat studies” as I call them, bring us no closer to solving any of the important issues that hip-hop allegedly exacerbates.

The November 6, 2007 New York Times article “For Clues on Teenage Sex, Experts Look to Hip-Hop” describes a study published by the journal Pediatrics and performed by the RAND Corporation which suggested that exposure to the “degrading lyrics” found in many hip-hop songs caused increased sexual activity in teens.  According to the study, those teens who were exposed to the highest levels of “degrading lyrics,” lyrics defined as “those that portrayed women as sexual objects, men as insatiable and sex as inconsequential,” were twice as likely to have had sex by the end of the study than those not exposed to such lyrics.  In other words, according to the RAND Corporation, some hip-hop music makes teens have sex.  On its face, the suggestion that when correcting for all other factors, music by rapper Ja Rule confounds a teen’s moral compass twice as powerfully as music by the pop crooners 98 Degrees, two artists explicitly mentioned in the RAND study, seems ludicrous.  I am sure Ludacris would agree.  This is not to suggest that all of the lyrics of hip-hop songs are easily defensible as art or even as decent expression.  However, one must wonder how well our society is served by studies that isolate hip-hop, though it is only one of the dozens of cultural influences to which a teen may be exposed, as a significant driver of teen decision making.

If one believes the conclusion of the RAND study, the logical next step would be to ban “degrading lyrics” in music or, at the very least, make this music much more difficult for a teenager to consume.  Currently, the objectionable music cited in the RAND study is marked with a Parental Advisory Label (PAL) and cannot be legally purchased in record stores by those under the age of 17.  Additionally, some retailers, including Wal-Mart, the largest seller of music in the country, will not sell any music affixed with the PAL.  Further, those who would consume these songs “by accident” on free radio or cable television stations like MTV or BET do not actually hear the unfiltered versions of these songs.  Granted, the “clean” versions of these songs are profanity-free lyrically but certainly not free of profane intent.   Nevertheless, those teens who consume music with “degrading lyrics” are doing so intentionally and after scaling the barriers currently erected to deter them.   Yet perhaps the positive impact of such a ban, like a decrease in teen sexual activity as claimed by the RAND study, would more than compensate for any cost incurred enforcing such a ban.  Problem solved?  Not so fast!  We’d better wait for the results of the Tony Soprano study before we spend too much time, effort and money banning hip-hop music. 

What?  You have not heard of the Tony Soprano study?  You have not missed anything because such a study does not exist.   The Sopranos, of course, was the hugely popular HBO series that ended its six season run in May.  In The Sopranos, the fictional New Jersey crime boss Tony Soprano, played by James Gandolfini, was an extremely profane, bigoted, murdering, serial adulterer who operated a strip club as a front for his illegal businesses.  The Sopranos featured countless instances of the language the RAND study defined as “degrading” and, as a TV program, was able to burn corresponding visual images into impressionable minds in a way that music cannot.  Undoubtedly, teens found it just as easy to view episodes of The Sopranos as to gain access to music marked with the PAL.  Yet, protests imploring HBO to stop airing its top-rated show have been non-existent while hip-hop music has been the target of many a protest.  Clearly, TV gangsters do not invoke the same wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth as do musical gangstas.

In fact, The Sopranos, as evidenced by the profuse acclaim the show received, was embraced wholeheartedly by the public and the television industry alike.  The show is the highest rated cable series of all-time.  It recognized with 16 Emmy awards during its six season run and dozens of other Emmy nominations.  TV Guide named The Sopranos the fifth best TV show of all-time.  Acceptance of The Sopranos was so complete that U.S. senator Hillary Clinton, in a short film also featuring former President Clinton, starred in a takeoff of the series finale episode of The Sopranos designed to help launch her U.S. Presidential campaign.  One of the most profane, violent and misogynistic shows in the history of American television was seen as innocuous enough and mainstream enough for a Presidential candidate to seek to be associated with it.  And hip-hop is the problem?  Hmmm.

The Sopranos, of course, is not the only show to receive the “societal impact pass” that hip-hop has yet to earn.   When was the last time an actor had to defend his or her fictional characters as rap acts like 2 Live Crew, Ice-T or Enimem have had to defend the content of their lyrics?  Rarely is an actor criticized for the potential deleterious impact on society of a role that he or she has played.   In fact, the bullet train to Hollywood accolades often goes through depravity.  Of the last six winners of the Best Actor Academy Award beginning with Denzel Washington in 2001, only Adrien Brody in The Pianist played a character whose moral character was not either questionable or unquestionably bad.  Denzel Washington was not widely accused of glamorizing crime or eroding the public’s trust in authority for his Oscar award winning portrayal the fictional dirty cop Alonzo Harris in movie Training Day.  Rightly, Denzel is considered by most to be a skilled practitioner of his craft, someone worthy of emulation.  Rapper Christopher Wallace, however, even in his Life After Death, must defend his character, the Notorious B.I.G.  Do we really believe that rappers are more dangerous Svengalis to impressionable teenaged minds than are actors?  Perhaps there is a different belief that drives some of the negative attention that hip-hop receives.