Hip Hop's Hatred of Black Women

Isn't it interesting that one of the few conversations to emerge in the wake of Don Imus's firing is the one on hip hop's prevalent misogyny? While I have no investments in the way that mainstream media will address this problem (for let's not kid ourselves; racialized misogyny can't help any community, but I'm also aware that it's just the outward signs of a deeper cultural wound, and a lame, ineffective band-aid is not going to cure the tumor growing inside), I am curious about the ways that communities of color have responded. So, it is with dismay that I report belatedly missing C-Span's airing of an important "Rap Session" on the subject: "Does Hip Hop Hate Women?" Of course, my own response to that question is: "Ya think?!?!"

The panel includes two scholars that I know personally (Mark Anthony Neal) and have been in correspondence with (T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting), and they are touring all across this great nation of ours to spearhead a "national townhall meeting" on the subject of hip-hop's sexism.

While it's timely and exciting to know this conversation is going on (I'm hoping PBS will eventually air this since I missed C-Span's coverage), I can only hope they bring a much needed discussion of intersectional analysis to the table (by this, I mean connecting the extreme misogyny expressed in the music to the global capitalism that has made this musical genre a rather lucrative billion-dollar industry as well as to the militarization that allows sexually violent images to co-exist with various U.S. imperialistic and war-mongering policies. Let's not pretend that the "Master's tools" aren't in full swing here). Moreover, it's high time that feminist issues take on "state of emergency" importance because gender is impacting on our communities in ways that surpass race (HIV/AIDS pandemic is but one such manifestation).

So, I was more than impressed with Sharpley-Whiting's efforts in her most recent book, Pimps Up, Ho's Down: Hip Hop's Hold on Young Black Women, which manages to tie in criticisms of hip hop with issues of sex tourism and black men's sudden interest in touring Brazil to hook up with light-skinned "exotic" women with big booties, courtesy of Snoop Dogg's "Beautiful" music video, or with the issue of rape and sexual violence and the black community's nonchalant response to alleged abusers like R. Kelly, who has yet to serve any jail time over his trafficking in child pornography or over alleged involvement with underage girls. And yet, Sharpley-Whiting is also careful not to pigeonhole black women and girls into categories of "victimhood." Taking a page out of Joan Morgan (who is also on that rap sessions panel), who reminded second-wave black feminists that they needed to complicate their criticisms of hip hop's sexism when acknowledging the complicity of the many young black women and girls who listen to the music and embrace the men spitting out sexist lyrics or who willingly show up to be featured in misogynistic videos, Sharpley-Whiting also asks us to bridge the nexus between black women's victimization and their agency in participating in hip hop culture.

For me, that's part of the problem. I'm not nearly as concerned about how many black women and girls are willing to wear thongs that show off all of their "junk in the trunk" in music videos as I am concerned that, because of corporate culture's investments in racism and misogyny, black women with political and feminist consciousness and even those who are interested in portraying a sex-positive, black women's "cunt power rocks!" sensibility, are not going to get the same airplay because there is already an assumption that such markets don't exist. The corporate machine works in tandem with other systems of power, which are invested in the PEOPLE not having any interest in Black Love, in Women's Empowerment, and in Poor People's Liberation.

May we all learn to embrace alternative media that will instill those values when mainstream and corporate media continue to push forward the most racist and misogynist expressions of black music in the "hip hop generation." I use this term, also embraced in Sharpley-Whiting's book, even as I bristle at such racially essentialist labels. I say this as a full-fledged “hip hop generationer” – Bronx-born (birthplace of hip hop) Black woman in my thirties who tuned in as a youngster to the “Roxanne” rap wars – but I also tuned into British new wave, MTV hard rock and Michael Jackson, and reggae and calypso, courtesy of my West Indian family.

Not only that, but I came of age when Queen Latifah’s radically feminist “Ladies First” premiered around the same time when the black feminist thought of academics like bell hooks and Patricia Hill Collins was in full force, thus intersecting “street” and “academic” black feminism. As much as I fit into this social group, I would disclaim the label as I would “third wave” feminism, for these social categories structure specific and exclusionary histories and aesthetic movements and unnecessarily restrict “black” and “feminist” experience.

Within our contemporary experience, I hope we can balance these degrading images that are so caught up in the "space between the legs" of a black woman (I highly recommend M. Nourbese Phillip's powerful essay, "Dis Place: The Space Between") but not caught up in the power that such space represents. Whenever you get depressed thinking of a horrendous, BET Uncut music video, like Nelly's infamous "Tip Drill," I highly recommend that you replace it with the image of hundreds of Nigerian women who stripped naked back in 2002 and, due to their actions, stopped the globalizing efforts of Chevron-Texaco from taking over their communities. Drawing from ancient rituals when African women bared their naked bodies (including the space between) to remind the men in their villages of an important message in this universe - that this body is the place of your origin and you will never be greater than that - we will need to remember that our bodies have that kind of power and that, collectively, black women's embodied resistance can stop corporate globalization in its tracks.

Now, if only the self-hating black men and women in mainstream hip hop, who willingly join forces with capitalistic and imperialistic white supremacy, can get back to the "roots" of self-affirmation and self-love, from which springs communal love. If only men en masse would stop using their penis as a weapon, instead using it for love and/or respect and recognizing it as the life force it also represents.

Does Hip Hop hate women? No more and no less than the culture that allows racism and misogyny to flourish.

Would Billie Holiday Win American Idol If She Were Still Alive?

I hope I remember the sinking feeling of tonight, and I'm posting here publicly on my blog, so that by next January, if I'm foolishly drawn to the sucktastic behemoth that is American Idol, someone will kindly remind me that there's no point... the best just will not win.

Yes, tonight, my favorite and, in my humble opinion, the best American Idol contestant I've ever seen since watching this show since its inception, just got voted off before the final showdown. I'm talking about none other than Melinda Doolittle.

I thought she had all the right ingredients - class act, amazing set of pipes, humility and grace, etc. Yet, here she is finishing 3rd when two other contestants, who're good enough at their various musical abilities but just so amateur in comparison to Melinda managed to sail right past her. Come again?

Since my last post was about American Idol and its "smoke and mirrors" approach to racial diversity, I think it's only appropriate that I revisit the show and my favorite contestant's fall tonight and call attention not only to their offensive "illusion of inclusion" approach to racial politics in this nation, but also to their "illusion of scouting the best talent," which is increasingly becoming downright laughable. This may have something to do with the "America votes" system in place, but what does it mean that the show proves time and again that "democracy breeds mediocrity"?

Interestingly, different representatives from the show kept doing interviews that acknowledged Melinda's crazy talent but always ended by saying things to the effect of: "she's too good for this show." Why would a versatile singer not do well in a singing competition, and why would her talent actually be considered a set-back? Hmmm... what is our culture's obsession with mediocrity?

But, something dawned on me. I suddenly had the strangest image of the most amazing vocalist this country has ever witnessed ever ... Billie Holiday...alive and well and actually auditioning for a show like AI because, as someone who once desired to be popular and a crossover success (she never really was when she was alive), it's something she might've done to break into the music business. Of course, back in the day, racism was to blame for her crossover limitations, but I also think that there is something so unique and musically stylish in the way that Billie sang that defies any kind of pop, generic appeal. Her voice is not showy, it's not stagey, yet it moves you to the core of your being, and the singing is so nuanced that most audiences who want music on the go - a la "fast food" - just would not appreciate the flavor and the subtlety.

While Melinda Doolittle is no Billie Holiday by any stretch of the imagination, there is something in her subtlety and in her vocal style that defied pop, generic appeal. It's unfortunate, and I'll need to remember that AI, above all else, is a show not to take seriously and one that a serious music artist should stay far away from. At the same time, it's become such a machine and an evil empire, that so many genuine artists and producers have had to acknowledge its presence, even grace its stage to promote their latest albums, so the show maintains a certain amount of "credibility."

However, when you become emotionally invested in a contestant because you genuinely think they've got the potential for greatness - as I definitely saw in Melinda who's not there yet, but damn!, she's got it in her to bust out and leave her mark in the music world - to see her lose to such lesser and (this is the kicker) MEDIOCRE performers, you cannot help but shake your head and lament the state of our culture.

I'm now going to bring up the specter of "race." Not in the crybaby sense, but just in a critical perspective sense. Let's be honest: Black women, as a whole, dominate the music scene and have been doing so for much of the modern era. The fact that the black female style of singing is called "diva" and all that only proves this point. Many can even say that Kelly Clarkson's strength in Season 1 was singing R&B style, but she was smart enough to not even compete in that market and turned her attention to rock, where she now flourishes as a pop star. Interestingly, Carrie Underwood also avoided this market by fitting in nicely in the country music niche. Unfortunately, Melinda Doolittle's singing kept getting comparisons to Tina Turner, Gladys Night, Stephanie Mills, and a host of other heavy-hitters, and the bottom line is: Melinda was held to a higher standard, and everyone expects black female singers to excel. They are the measuring stick for everyone else, so how can you outmeasure yourself? Not only do measuring sticks hold everyone else to a specific standard, but such vocals are guaranteed to shore up everyone else - hence why you'll always find black women as back-up vocalists, EVEN ON THIS SHOW!

In other words, American Idol is just not a good venue to find the next Aretha, Whitney, or even Mary J. Blige. In fact, I'd say now that, because hip-hop corporate culture is such a powerful force outside of AI, that any black female vocalist who can't fit into that genre is going to fail (Fantasia has been marketed toward this, but her vocals are just too unique - hence why she would be the only black female vocalist to win on AI because her style doesn't easily invite comparisons with other greats - to simply function as a "hook" in a rap song). Melinda is totally unsuited for that whole scene, but I'm still crossing my fingers that she - like Jill Scott - will one day emerge as "last women standing" by the time all the pop stars - Rihanna, Beyonce, Ciara, etc. - have aged themselves out of popularity. More than the degrading images of black women that hip-hop has put out, I'm disgusted at the way that whole genre has screwed up the way we listen to black women's singing.

And before anyone points to the biracial Jordin Sparks as the "but she's black" argument to debunk this theory, my response is: I doubt the public who voted for her sees her as a "black diva." No one would compare this light-skinned, young, pretty pretty princess to Tina or Gladys. Mariah, maybe, and even then, I don't see Jordin fitting into the hip-hop/R&B scene either. The producers will be in for a surprise: Miss Pro-life is Contemporary Christian through and through.

I can only hope that Melinda, who has struck me as a woman with low-self-esteem issues, doesn't take this to heart - it was clear from the last few weeks that she wanted to win this thing. Now, she knows that being talented and personable isn't enough, that being old and considered "too big" or too "unattractive" ain't getting you nowhere. May she persevere and may some fiercely talented record producer actually sign her up, after hearing her these past few months. Would be a shame to let that kind of talent go to waste.

But, most of all, I hope she'll take solace in knowing that no way in hell would a Billie Holiday, the greatest singer America's ever had, ever win on American Idol.

Unfortunately, AI has done to music what McDonald's done to food: over-processed it to the point where there are no nutrients, and the intake of it is just not good for you. Worse, if you get used to the processed flavor, you'll prefer it to the real deal. The Apocalypse is upon us, indeed!

Illusions of Inclusion and the American Idol Empire

Thank you to the Women of Color Blog and Please Professor Black Woman for documenting the latest in anti-immigration and hate crimes, especially in alerting me to the latest Intelligence Report put out by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which indicates a significant rise in hate crimes since 2000 - a rise astutely connected to anti-immigration. And, let me add, also connected to intense racial profiling begun in the wake of September 11 and the perpetual criminalization of black folk begun since slavery times. So, you know, there is progress...and then there is regression, or worse, what I once said to a friend of mine, the realization that far too many white people exist in this country who don't think all that differently from their slave-owning forbears. After 400 plus years, that's a frightening thought to put into historical perspective.

So, what - pray tell - does this have to do with American Idol? It may take some elaborating, so I ask for your patience.

The other day, I had two separate windows opened up on my internet server, when checking out a link. It was the most ironic thing because I'm an avid viewer of the TV phenom that is AI while also keeping up with various alternative and mainstream news sources, independent media, academic articles of interests, and feminist blogs. (What can I say? I embrace my contradictory love for both high-and-low culture.)

It was while listening to a YouTube replay of the 6 finalists' rendition of U2's American Prayer during their overstuffed, self-important fundraising special that was "Idol Gives Back," that I came upon a news story about the May Day immigration rallies that met with a brutal response from the LAPD. I watched the melee play out on a windows media video replay with the idealistic voices of our multiracial AI contestants singing, "These are the hands / what are we going to build with them? / This is a church you can't see / Give me your tired and poor and huddled masses / You know they're yearning to breathe freeeeeee!!"

What a brilliant moment of irony, let me tell you, hearing those young earnest voices, trying to hold on for dear life as they plead for America's votes, while other Americans are literally putting their lives on the line to protect immigration rights - in a land that thrived because the original inhabitants couldn't deport those pesky Europeans who brought with them nasty and malevolent diseases and enslaved Africans, who established white supremacy, and who has since played the game of who qualifies as "white" and who'll never be "American."

When you get to the top of the mountain / Remember me ... Remember meeeeee!!

I dare say it would make a rather cutting video montage of various scenes of racial intolerance and anti-immigration sentiment with this AI anthem playing in the background. But then again, the whole show is an ironic send up to what's going on with our "Hateration Nation."

Last night, we learned the results of who is going into AI's Top 4, three women of color (Melinda Doolittle, Lakisha Jones, and Jordin Sparks) and a funky white boy (Blake Lewis). Most would agree that, for the first time in years, the best of the crop emerged on top. It remains to be seen if we'll be able to have an all-black-female final 2 showdown. Quite fascinating in a season that had us witnessing Don Imus insult a predominately black women's college basketball team and the accuser behind the Duke Lacrosse rape scandal get viciously outed and virtually crucified in the blogosphere when the charges against 3 of the team members were dropped. At the same time, this is the same season when we witnessed former AI contestant Jennifer Hudson, who placed 7th on the show, emerge out of nowhere to outshine Beyonce and snatch an Oscar her first time out the gate in her debut performance in Dreamgirls. Impressive for a plus-size black woman who can SANG.

Of course, the sharply observant and astute black feminist scholar, Farah Jasmine Griffin, said it best when she wrote that the black woman's voice is a "quintessential American voice… It is one of its founding sounds, and the singing black woman is one of its founding spectacles. But because it develops alongside and not fully within the nation, it maintains a space for critique and protest." That protest is perhaps best exemplified in the divaesque anthem in Dreamgirls, when J-Hud's Effie White belts out, "And I am Telling You I'm Not Going," a song to pay attention to, a voice that cries out pain, attitude, rage, and power... so is it any wonder, when most black women and other women of color get ignored in national discourse, our singers can at least give us an audience?

Granted, that audience can't hear us very well and often reduces us to the singing spectacle that Griffin describes. Which is why, as excited as I am for the achievements of Jennifer, Melinda, Lakisha, and Jordin, I'm also painfully aware of how their vocal power and voiced desires get contained and reframed for tokenism and "illusions of inclusion." From the spectacle of AI alone, we'd think everything was just fine, equal, and merit-based. After all, the big-boned "divas" outlasted their skinnier and whiter counterparts and laid to waste a good portion of their white-boy competitors (even good-looking Justin Timberlake-lookalikes, one who was rumored to be romantically involved with the frontrunner, a gossipy piece of fabrication that many on the Internet roundly dismissed because no one could take seriously the idea of a big black girl being someone's romantic interest). Surely, this show represents the best ideals of American "democracy" and merit-based equal opportunity, right?

So, why does everyone get so antsy whenever the subject of race is discussed with regards to the show? Who could forget, when Jennifer was ousted back in 2004, guest judge Elton John accused America of being "incredibly racist"? Consider also this interesting article that quotes the show's exec producer, Nigel Lythgoe, as saying, "We still hear people calling us a racist show, and I think it's so idiotic and such a stupid statement ... No. 1, you can see by the show itself that we're not racist. No. 2, it isn't down to the show at this point. It's down to America."

So, based on this statement, we understand the show to be non-racist because the majority of the remaining contestants are black women? Remember, what Griffin said? We are the quintessential American voice, of course we're going to do well in a singing competition. We represent a long, long, awfully long line of vocal skill: Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Mahalia Jackson, Nina Simone, Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner, Whitney Houston, Mary J. Blige, and a bunch of others I have to leave out to make space on my blog. Even the black female backup singers on the show testify to our vocal dominance in popular culture.

Far more telling in the racialized spectacles on this show is the ridiculous and cruel jokes made at the expense of Sanjaya Malakar, a sweet, infectiously smiling teenage Asian-American boy (who's so flaming but doesn't even know it since he's only 17) who couldn't represent "model minority" status with his mediocre vocals and whose non-singing, hair shtick lost its humor the same week that the Virginia Tech shootings occurred. We could say that, during such a solemn week, Sanjaya was no longer funny, and who knows how much of the Asianness of the killer (whose birthplace in South Korea was played to the hilt in news coverage even though he migrated to this country at age 8 and became a naturalized citizen) also led to his demise when he placed 7th in the competition? I do know that such emphasis on the killer's "foreignness" when even his warped videos were an indication that his militia-inspired violence was American-style homegrown terrorism, ala Columbine and Timothy McVeigh - that combined with our ridicule of Sanjaya - reinforced how our culture, despite emerging from a multiracial, pluralist society, refuses to affirm anything beyond a white-centered concept of Americana, shored up by our fascination with black entertainment and reduction of race relations as a primarily black-white issue with everyone else functioning as "illegals" or "foreigners."

Despite our exposure to AI-style diversity, our nation's backward responses to various crises featuring racial and ethnic otherness - from Virginia Tech to Duke Lacrosse to Don Imus to to 9/11 to Guantanamo Bay to Abu Ghraib to Hurricane Katrina - just seems to reinforce what another black feminist scholar, sociologist Patricia Hill Collins terms the "new racism" in the 21st century: a racism that insists that we are all "colorblind," thus ignoring the systemic racial hierarchies that continue to advance white supremacy or normalcy while non-white spectacle is always viewed as "different" or "unAmerican."

It may seem "idiotic" to Nigel Lythgoe to question the racial politics of his show, but I certainly don't question the "Empire" that it has become, dominating everything in the entertainment industry (see this New York Times article on its "schoolyard bully" status) and churning out generic pop stars. An anti-artistry formula that even Prince - who appeared on the show's finale last year (keeping the producers guessing at the last minute) - had to acknowledge but who later went on to promote a concert that he headlined, which featured some talented music artists who don't stand a chance against the AI music machine.

Prince knows how to play the game, for his AI appearance I'm sure landed him the Superbowl halftime performance gig this year, where he managed to remind all of America what music artistry is about while also pushing the FCC-decency standards with his unforgettable silhouetted performance of him and his guitar - ala Jimi Hendrix - recreating his amazing black phallus. I also think it doubled as a big, gigantic middle finger to America for their "outrage" over Janet Jackson's disrobed breast scandal while also giving a subtle lesson that said, "See, Janet! This is how you push the envelope ... and get away with it!"

So, all this is to say: AI is still a fun show to watch, especially when you get emotionally invested in the contestants, but I also see how deeply connected and entrenched it is in shoring up systemic inequalities while perpetuating an illusion of inclusion. I for one am rooting for my favorite - AI season 6 frontrunner Melinda Doolittle. She's a star being born right before my eyes week after week. Yes, I think she is that incredible.

Simon said she's a young Gladys Knight, Randy said this week, she channeled Tina Turner. I personally think she's good enough to count those legends as her peers. I've cried approximately 3 times this season over her performances (over "My Funny Valentine," "Home," and "There Will Come a Day"). Tuesday night's rendition of Bon Jovi's "Have a Nice Day", when I rewatched it on YouTube, convinced me that she is this year's American Idol based just on versatility alone.

If Melinda is shockingly booted before the finale or finishes in the runner-up position, all my hopes in America's ability to separate the wheat from the chaff will be thoroughly dashed - but we've seen these abilities diminished by racism and sexism in the past, why be shocked now? At the same time, if she wins this damn thing, and she is reduced to the same R&B box that they placed Ruben and Fantasia in, my heart will be so crushed! Melinda is so much bigger than that. Their failure of imagination when it comes to marketing their black idols is truly astounding.

Oh for the long ago days when Quincy Jones and Motown were cleverly astute in crossing over their black stars. Somehow, I blame this racially segregated trend in music all on hip hop, which has dominated all of black music (including R&B and soul and even venturing into gospel and non-American music like reggae and soca-calypso). There's something terribly essentialist in hip-hop corporate culture's construct of "black" to simultaneously mean "urban" and "street," thus reducing possible spaces for women like Melinda to shine. At least Whitney, Tina, and Gladys didn't have these limitations in their heyday, nor did they have the same corporate music culture - so closely tied to the adult entertainment industry - completely dependent on marketing their songstresses to look like porn stars, further limiting Melinda's crossover success.

At some point though, we have to believe that talent will prevail and that the quintessential American voice that is the black female singer will rise again and stomp out the endless string of video vixens and black-male-comedians-resurrecting-mammy with a vengeance.

Or, as I'd like to think of it: It ain't over until the fat black woman SANGS!