By Lauren Carter
By now the Chuck D/Hot 97 beef has been well-documented by blogs, and anyone with access to Twitter can see the back-and-forth exchange that’s spanned several days.
Long story short, Chuck D blasted Hot 97 for this year’s Summer Jam show, calling it a “sloppy fiasco” and criticizing the liberal use of the n-word, questioning where Hot 97 would be if the concert had been filled with Anti-Semitic and gay slurs. He wants urban radio to “get it right or be gone.”
Ebro Darden and Peter Rosenberg of Hot 97 responded, and a war of Twitter words ensued.
On the surface this seems like just another social media spat that will be forgotten tomorrow, but in reality it runs much deeper than that.
This is not just about a sloppy show or racial slurs. It’s not about Summer Jam or Hot 97 or Ebro and Rosenberg. It’s not about specific hip hop radio stations or specific hip hop concerts. It’s about what all of these things collectively add up to. This is about what “hip hop” has become, and Summer Jam was just the most visible example.
This is about the fact that a culture that was based on peace, love, unity and having fun, one that served as a form of self-expression for marginalized and oppressed people, has become a corporate-controlled means to reinforce the very oppression it was created to fight.
This is about the fact that we openly degrade ourselves through hip hop, that our “values” have shifted from life-affirming qualities to a death program of promiscuity, anti-love, drug use, drug dealing, materialism, violence and criminality, and people who claim to love hip hop promote these “values” every day.
It’s ironic that Hot 97’s tag line is “where hip hop lives” because if we’re talking about hip hop culture in its original, true form, Hot 97 is not where hip hop lives, it’s where hip hop dies. And Hot 97 is just one of many corporate “ambassadors” of hip hop that are actively killing the culture’s essence every day.
Read the article in its entirety at RapRehab.com
Lauren Carter is a writer, editor and creative consultant based in Boston. Connect with her on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, and check out her blog at www.bylaurencarter.com. For more information about her writing, editing or consulting services, email her at bylaurencarter@gmail.com.