Announcing The Hampton Institute!

I'm updating here at OI to announced that I am part of an exciting, new project called The Hampton Institute. Future writing I do will be sent there, so everyone check it out!

http://www.hamptoninstitution.org/

FB: https://www.facebook.com/TheHamptonInstitute
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HamptonThink

About the Hampton Institute:

In the late 1920's, while imprisoned under Benito Mussolini's fascist government in Italy, Antonio Gramsci compiled 32 notebooks containing roughly 3,000 pages of work, touching on everything from Italian politics and history to social, economic, and political theory and analysis. During this time, Gramsci coined the term "organic intellectual" to describe conscious members of the working class whom he felt must be developed in contradistinction to the traditional intellectual "clergy," composed of "men of letters, philosophers and professors" who were intimately tied to the dominant culture, and therefore compromised and limited in their own capacity. "All men (and women, we might add) are intellectuals," wrote Gramsci, "but not all men have in society the function of intellectuals." As a Marxist, it was no secret that Gramsci's ideas were centered on the need for revolutionary opposition to the oppressive social relations perpetuated by the capitalist structure - whether represented in the private sphere through property and labor exploitation, or the public sphere through state-backed repression. And while traditional intellectuals certainly played, and continue to play, an important role in this struggle, Gramsci saw the development of the organic intellectual as a crucial component in the ongoing battle for consciousness which exists within the daily lives of the mass of people. "There is no human activity from which every form of intellectual participation can be excluded," explained Gramsci. "Everyone carries on some form of intellectual activity, participates in a particular conception of the world, has a conscious line of moral conduct, and therefore contributes to sustain a conception of the world or to modify it, that is, to bring into being new modes of thought." The organic intellectual possesses the unique ability to touch those who exist within their own social grouping: the working class.

In the late 1920's, while imprisoned under Benito Mussolini's fascist government in Italy, Antonio Gramsci compiled 32 notebooks containing roughly 3,000 pages of work, touching on everything from Italian politics and history to social, economic, and political theory and analysis. During this time, Gramsci coined the term "organic intellectual" to describe conscious members of the working class whom he felt must be developed in contradistinction to the traditional intellectual "clergy," composed of "men of letters, philosophers and professors" who were intimately tied to the dominant culture, and therefore compromised and limited in their own capacity. "All men (and women, we might add) are intellectuals," wrote Gramsci, "but not all men have in society the function of intellectuals." As a Marxist, it was no secret that Gramsci's ideas were centered on the need for revolutionary opposition to the oppressive social relations perpetuated by the capitalist structure - whether represented in the private sphere through property and labor exploitation, or the public sphere through state-backed repression. And while traditional intellectuals certainly played, and continue to play, an important role in this struggle, Gramsci saw the development of the organic intellectual as a crucial component in the ongoing battle for consciousness which exists within the daily lives of the mass of people. "There is no human activity from which every form of intellectual participation can be excluded," explained Gramsci. "Everyone carries on some form of intellectual activity, participates in a particular conception of the world, has a conscious line of moral conduct, and therefore contributes to sustain a conception of the world or to modify it, that is, to bring into being new modes of thought." The organic intellectual possesses the unique ability to touch those who exist within their own social grouping: the working class.

As a youth organizer for the NAACP and eventual leader of the Chicago chapter of the Black Panther Party (BPP), Fred Hampton was the embodiment of Gramsci's "organic intellectual." Born to working class parents, Hampton became a pre-law major in college and deployed his knowledge to combat police brutality and unfair law enforcement practices that targeted impoverished black youth in the greater Chicago area. Hampton's realization of the inherent connection between institutional racism and class politics led him to negotiate a "class-conscious, multi-racial alliance" between politicized organizations (the BPP and Students for a Democratic Society) and Chicago's major street gangs (Young Patriots, Young Lords, Blackstone Rangers, Brown Berets and Red Guard Party). As BPP's local leader, Hampton organized rallies, assisted with maintaining a local medical clinic, taught weekly political education classes, and operated a Free Breakfast Program for underprivileged children. As both an organic intellectual and de facto educator, Hampton's brilliant oratory skills were not used to place himself above the oppressed, but rather to immerse himself within the oppressed community of which he was a member. His words, and the linguistic style in which his analysis was advanced, were a shining example of the simultaneous process of education and dialogue that must take place with the oppressed. Ultimately, Hampton was the praxis to Gramsci's theory. By combining an effective class analysis with a stage-based social application that included "real world" solutions, he was the quintessential revolutionary. "That's what the Breakfast for Children Program is," explained Hampton. "A lot of people think it's simply charity, but what does it do? It takes people from a stage to a stage to another stage. Any program that's revolutionary is an advancing program. Revolution is change." In addition to praxis, he and the BPP fortified and transcended the struggle against racial oppression by effectively tying it to the international class struggle, much like Dr. King was doing with a critical assessment of war and poverty. "We're not gonna fight fire with fire, we're gonna fight fire with water," cried Hampton. "We're not gonna fight racism with racism, we're gonna fight racism with (working class) solidarity!" His untimely and tragic murder at the hands of Chicago police would ultimately stifle the revolutionary momentum of the time. However, as Hampton once proclaimed, "You can kill the revolutionary, but you can never kill the revolution!"As a youth organizer for the NAACP and eventual leader of the Chicago chapter of the Black Panther Party (BPP), Fred Hampton was the embodiment of Gramsci's "organic intellectual." Born to working class parents, Hampton became a pre-law major in college and deployed his knowledge to combat police brutality and unfair law enforcement practices that targeted impoverished black youth in the greater Chicago area. Hampton's realization of the inherent connection between institutional racism and class politics led him to negotiate a "class-conscious, multi-racial alliance" between politicized organizations (the BPP and Students for a Democratic Society) and Chicago's major street gangs (Young Patriots, Young Lords, Blackstone Rangers, Brown Berets and Red Guard Party). As BPP's local leader, Hampton organized rallies, assisted with maintaining a local medical clinic, taught weekly political education classes, and operated a Free Breakfast Program for underprivileged children. As both an organic intellectual and de facto educator, Hampton's brilliant oratory skills were not used to place himself above the oppressed, but rather to immerse himself within the oppressed community of which he was a member. His words, and the linguistic style in which his analysis was advanced, were a shining example of the simultaneous process of education and dialogue that must take place with the oppressed. Ultimately, Hampton was the praxis to Gramsci's theory. By combining an effective class analysis with a stage-based social application that included "real world" solutions, he was the quintessential revolutionary. "That's what the Breakfast for Children Program is," explained Hampton. "A lot of people think it's simply charity, but what does it do? It takes people from a stage to a stage to another stage. Any program that's revolutionary is an advancing program. Revolution is change." In addition to praxis, he and the BPP fortified and transcended the struggle against racial oppression by effectively tying it to the international class struggle, much like Dr. King was doing with a critical assessment of war and poverty. "We're not gonna fight fire with fire, we're gonna fight fire with water," cried Hampton. "We're not gonna fight racism with racism, we're gonna fight racism with (working class) solidarity!" His untimely and tragic murder at the hands of Chicago police would ultimately stifle the revolutionary momentum of the time. However, as Hampton once proclaimed, "You can kill the revolutionary, but you can never kill the revolution!"

Rampage: "I'm done fighting" and What It Says About the UFC

Quinton "Rampage" Jackson told the world on Tuesday that he's "done fighting."

Hate him or love him,  the news of Rampage's declaration that he will no longer fight hits many of us fans quite hard.  Rampage is, undoubtedly, one of the most exciting, skilled fighters to grace the Light Heavyweight division of the UFC. From his often humorous interviews and coaching on the Ultimate Fighter reality show to his emotional and legal journeys that we sympathetically followed him on, Rampage has grown a significant fan base in the sport. On one hand, his decision is a percussive blow to those of us who love watching him in all his glory; his percussive punching power and his unique, vibrant fighting style always prove a thrilling watch. On the other, he stipulates a laundry list of rather convincing reasons for his choice. He mentions his repeated injuries and his desire to pursue an acting career an ancillary motives in his decision. However, what he clearly articulates, if not in these words, is that he is fed up with the authoritarian, corporate structure of the world's dominant fighting organization, the UFC, and it's figurehead Dana White.

Rampage cites a variety of problems he has encountered with the management of the UFC. His first line says it all: "The UFC has done a lot for me but I think I have done more for them." From there, he airs out all the crap he's been put through to fight in the UFC, from being pushed into fights he claims he was not ready for and having to compete with serious jaw injuries, to fighting matches which he says "wasn't even worth it to me financially," and being snubbed for a rematch after he lost the 205 pound belt due to a controversial decision against Forrest Griffon.

On top of this, Dana White's shady deals are intricately woven all throughout the drama. After promising Rampage that he could fight for the belt after hosting The Ultimate Fighter reality show season 10:

"After I signed the contract Dana then changes his mind & says I have to fight Rashad [Evans]& even told me what to say in the press & so my fans think I was scared to fight Machida [205-belt holder]. After all that I still never complained & I did it all."

Perhaps the most humanizing section of his entire entry is when he explains why he simply requested that the UFC administration push his fight with Rashad Evans back a month or two:

"Then this movie role came about that I have been trying to get for over a year & as soon as I found out I was close to getting it, I called Dana right away & asked to push the Memphis fight back just a month or so. I told him what this movie role meant to me. I told him that I used to bond with my father watching the tv show as a kid when my parents where still married & it represents the memories I had with my father when we lived together. My dad became an alcohalic & addicted to drugs & we grew apart. But after my dad got his life back together, I was so proud of my dad & I told him I would always take care of him in the future & make him proud of me. My dad & I are still very big fans of the show & I am basically doing this for the childhood memories I had spending time in front of the tv with my dad. Dana went on the internet & mocked me because of that & I still did nothing. Dana & I finally talked & we made up & then after that he went back on the internet & said some bullshit & he was talking bad about the movie when information is not even supposed to be released & talking about payments which is not even true could really hurt my future acting career, which could very well last longer than my fighting career. I'm not like Randy Couture. My body has been getting so many different injuries that I wont be able to fight until my forties & neither do I want to fight that long. So I feel like my second career could be in jeopardy.. so I'm done fighting."

It was that piece, perhaps, that was most heart-wrenching of all. Quinton Jackson is, like each and every one of us, a human-being with emotions, feelings, hopes, and desires. He is not simply a caged animal for us to enjoy. Unfortunately, the corporate, profit-driven framework in which Dana White and the UFC management function promotes the dehumanization of the fighters within the organization.

Dana White, and the Fertita brothers who own the majority of the UFC, ought to be ashamed of themselves. Often we forget that it is not the promoters, not the owners of the fighting organizations who have to actually go out and get punched, kicked, submitted, slammed, and what have you for them to make their enormous profits. Regardless of all the hyped-up discourse around White "really bringing MMA to the mainstream," he has done little more than monopolize the sport and push away good fighters or seriously strain the lives of the ones who put up with him.

Dana White has thoroughly discredited himself as a decent human-being multiple times. Replying to a female MMA journalist who wrote about managers and agents losing backstage passes in an "to separate fighters from their business representatives," White responded with a "disgraceful diatribe" in which he "calls Hunt a “f—ing bitch” and refers to a source of Hunt’s as a lying, “f—ing faggot.” Afterwords, he gave a half-hearted apology to the gay community yet refused to apologize to the author, Loretta Hunt. This disgusting debacle is just a drop in the bucket.

White has consistently proven he is the epitome of the vicious leech which lives off the labor of others while pretending that he is helping them. Freelance writer Jake Eman lays out a pretty good list of reasons why Dana White is a threat to the fighters and fans of mixed martial arts. While I think it is important to point out that White is, more or less, a figurehead for a profit-hungry organization and his replacement would mean very little in terms of restructuring how the UFC operates, Eman's criticisms are well taken. He cites the fact that the UFC repeatedly attempts to discourage competition, disrespects the sport and plays favorites in order to stimulate particular markets, and hypocritically criticizes boxing while committing many of the same sins boxing promoters are notorious for. Perhaps his most powerful arguement concerns pay:

"Dana White underpays the fighters in the UFC by an insane margin. The fighters don't even come close to sniffing the money that they are solely responsible for generating. For example, for UFC 100, billed as the "biggest night in the history UFC", the UFC paid a total of approximately $2.2 million to all of the fighters on the card that night, which includes $400,000 of special bonuses.

Lesnar is reported to make about $3 million including his share of the pay-per-view sales, which is an extra $2.6 million from his salary. Georges St. Pierre is also set to receive a share of the PPV, so let's just assume that totals out to another $2.6 million for him as well, because it certainly wouldn't be more. The result is $7.4 million paid to UFC fighters for the UFC 100 event, about $6 million of which went to 2 fighters, leaving the other 18 fighters to divvy up the remains.

The live attendance gate for the fight was $5.1 million. Dana White said he'd be thrilled with 1.5 million pay-per-view buys, so let's just underestimate that at a cool 1 million buys, which the UFC has done before, at $45 a pop. That's a total of $50 million generated not including foreign rights, closed circuit distribution and other earnings. That means, even tweaking the figures in his favor, Dana White and the UFC paid 15% of the money they earned that night to all of the fighters combined. Outrageous."

Outrageous is right, but we cannot assume that simply replacing Dana White would actually change much. Let's face it, the UFC is the largest, wealthiest fighting organization out there. They're goal is not, as some may suggest, to simply provide entertainment or to promote the welfare of their fighters; they're ultimate motivation is to make money. They function, as with all any other private institution in our society, to pursue profits. We can learn something here from Andrew Carnegie who maintained that he was "not in the business of making steel but in making a profit."

Sportswriter Dave Zirin spoke out wonderfully in a recent piece on boxing. Replace the word boxing with MMA and the passage transfers over seamlessly:

"We need to confront everything that's rotten in boxing. Right now there is no commissioner and no governing authority. There are no unions, and there is no collective bargaining on behalf of fighters. There is no health care, no mental health treatment and no one watching out for those who suffer from the debilitating effects of brain damage and its conjoined twin, depression."

For those of us who hate to see Rampage go, we should at least know where to direct the blame. It is not his fault, and we should stand behind him in his decision.

How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People's History of Political Rap (VI and VII)

This is the fourth post covering the final sections of my paper on hip-hop and the political and economic conditions under which it was fostered. Due to blog limitations, my footnotes are not included. However, I will post the Works Cited with the last post. Also, if anyone wants a PDF copy (around 35 pages, sort of long) I will be glad to e-mail them one.

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INDEX: How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People’s History of Political Rap

+ Introduction: Historical Phenomena, Hip-Hop Culture, and Rap Music
+ The South Bronx in the 1970’s and Material Conditions in Hip-Hop’s Birthplace
+ Afrocentricity, Black Power, and Hip-Hop’s New School
+ West Coast Projects, the Rise of Gangsta Rap, and Congress’s War on the Youth
+ Corporate Consolidation and the Telecommunications Act
+ Bursting Onto the Mainstream Scene and Contemporary Political Rap + Hip-Hop at a Crossroads: Conditions Today and Where Do We Go From Here? + Works Cited

Disclaimer: The language expressed in this article is an uncensored reflection of the views of the artists as they so chose to speak and express themselves. Censoring their words would do injustice to the freedom of expression and political content this article intends to explore. Therefore, some of the language appearing below may be offensive to personal, cultural, or political sensibilities.

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Bursting Onto the Mainstream Scene and Contemporary Political Rap

Hip-hop stepped forward into the mainstream political establishment in 2004 when it had a brief, rather superficial media campaign targeting youth voters. Rap mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs used hip-hop as a platform to organize a campaign under the sensationalist title “Vote or Die” as an attempt to register younger voters, garner youth participation, and generate excitement about the elections. While registering voters was only a marginal success, it was clear the goals were decidedly apolitical with little actual political motivation for urban youth who, for years, had felt alienated from mainstream political discourse. The two candidates put forward by America’s ruling elites, George Bush and John Kerry, had platforms so similar it was challenging to generate enough interest for young people to mobilize within the context of the two-party duopoly. Four years later, however, hip-hop would emerge as an unimaginably powerful advertisement for Barack Obama. His 2008 campaign sparked immense interest within the hip-hop community and debate flourished over whether or not hip-hop should stand behind Obama. It was little more than a decade prior that Tupac hopelessly exclaimed “although it seems heaven sent, we ain’t ready, to see a Black president” on the song “Changes.” Now, energized by a candidate whom, for the first time, they felt would reach out to the hip-hop generation, many artists, such as Jay-Z, took center stage in fundraising concerts and spoke proudly of their involvement in his campaign. Nas, one of hip-hops “most brilliant orators” whose own political trajectory involved going from conscious gangster with his first album Illmatic (1994) to passionate revolutionary with his latest release Untitled (2008), “captures the gambit of fears, hopes and doubts that swirl together in the consciousness” of the black community on the track “Black President:”

KKK is like "what the fuck," loadin' they guns up / Loadin' mine too, ready to ride / Cause I'm ridin' with my crew / He dies--we die too / But on a positive side / I think Obama provides hope and challenges minds / Of all races and colors to erase the hate / And try and love one another, so many political snakes / We in need of a break / I'm thinkin' I can trust this brotha / But will he keep it way real? / Every innocent nigga in jail gets out on appeal / When he wins--will he really care still?

Nas is not alone in his critical support for Obama; Mary J. Blige and rapper Big Boi from Outkast compose a song of solidarity for the working class and poor in “Something’s Gotta Give,” which challenges Obama to truly listen to the concerns and pressures of urban communities while earnestly calling for desperately needed social change. Big Boi articulates his working class consciousness when he rhymes, “You know the common folk, blue collar, day-to-day workers that squeeze a dollar / so maybe they can swallow a little, not a lot, just enough to fill that bottle / But it's a million dollars a gallon for gas to get to work tomorrow." Unapologetically political, well-known artists creatively maneuvered political dialogue and discussion into the mainstream discourse.

Still, these odes to Obama were able to push through corporate outlets partly because their content and message remained safely within the established political borders. Obama, after all, garnered large support from many of the capitalist classes ruling elites, whom viewed the Republicans eight-year run as disastrous for the United State’s economic power and image abroad. Despite this brief stint within mainstream circles, political hip-hop did not begin, and it will not end, with Obama. Radical hip-hop and revolutionary artists like Immortal Technique, Dead Prez, Paris, Lupe Fiasco, Son of Nun, and an innumerable amount of other artists remain marginalized and embroiled in the struggle to spread their message in the face of a competitive, cut-throat jungle of corporate conglomerates and consolidated, top-down radio. Often, hip-hop artists formulate unique narratives or relay stunningly academic critiques of society that tie together seemingly separate issues and help the listener foster a more critical, holistic analysis of larger societal forces.

On his latest single, “3rd World,” Immortal Technique utilizes a percussive, hard-hitting instrumental produced by DJ Green Lantern to expose U.S. imperialism and militarism across the globe, brilliantly explicating on the concept of contemporary war as a natural outgrowth of capitalism. Born in Peru and representing his third world roots, Technique explains that he is:
From where the only place democracy's acceptable, is if America’s candidate is electable… from where they overthrow Democratic leaders, not for the people but for the Wall Street journal readers… So I’ma start a global riot, that not even your fake anti-Communist dictators can keep quiet!

On “Ghetto Manifesto,” The Coup humorously outline ghetto conditions, sardonically utilizing hip-hop lingo to emphasize their point, “Got a house arrest anklet but it don't bling bling, got a homie with a cell but that shit don't ring!” Later, they put out a call for organization and mobilization, explaining “even renowned historians have found that, the people only bounce back when they pound back.” They simultaneously challenge nationalist ideology, “the trees we got lifted by made our feet dangle, so when I say burn one I mean the Star-Spangled.” A plethora of underground and independent rap artists express similar themes which address the need for autonomous political organization and present alternative, more humane visions for society.

Hip-Hop at a Crossroad: Conditions Today and Where Do We Go From Here?

Hip-hop was cultivated in the streets as an innovative response of urban minorities, traditionally marginalized by dominant political and economic structures, seeking a voice of their own. Alienated by harsh conditions imposed upon them by an advanced capitalist society, these urban youth sought an outlet where they could foster their own conceptions of identity and challenge institutional oppression, whether individually or collectively. Poverty, unemployment, a decrepit educational system, cuts in social services, and capitalism’s inherent need to maintain a permanent underclass blended together to create a matrix in which a new, counter-hegemonic culture would emerge with the dialectically opposed characteristics of both the oppressor and the liberationist. Today, the devastating conditions which birthed hip-hop remain a reality and, in some instances, have intensified. The recent crisis capitalism has found itself in continues the downward spiral and the world economy appears close to collapse. The conditions for the working-class and the poor, however, have only worsened over the thirty years since hip-hop established itself as a cultural entity. Unemployment is skyrocketing nationally across color lines but in many cities, such as Milwaukee, Detroit, and Chicago, black unemployment is at or near 50 percent. Already claiming the highest rates of poverty in the industrial world, U.S. poverty statistics have risen drastically since the onset of the world banking crash, placing both Blacks and Latinos at or above 20 percent; youth minority statistics are often much higher. The loss of jobs, combined with the collapse of the housing market and sub-prime predatory lending, has pushed an immense amount of working-class residents out of their homes and left nearly fifty million people without healthcare. Schools, after a brief glimmer of hope with post-civil rights integration, have become more segregated now than they were thirty years ago with public school systems in Chicago, St. Louis, Los Angeles, Detroit, Philadelphia, Cleveland, and many other urban areas 80-95 percent Black and Hispanic.

Thus, the conditions in which hip-hop originally arose have not improved. Social commentator and activist Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor postulates these are rational outcomes of the dominant political economy:

The material impact on the lives of Black workers should be clear enough, but ideologically, the systematic and institutional impoverishment of African American communities perpetuates the impression that Blacks are inferior and defective. These perceptions are perpetuated and magnified by the mass media, Hollywood and the general means of ideological and cultural production in bourgeois society. The recurrence and persistence of racism in this economic system is not accidental or arbitrary. American capitalism is intrinsically racist.

Like Taylor, independent hip-hop has, throughout its existence, maintained a critical approach to the capitalist mode of production and the material conditions resulting from it. On “Window to My Soul,” Stic.man of Dead Prez painfully professes the emotional trauma he experienced as he watched his older brother develop a serious drug addiction. Rather than blame the individual, an old rhetorical tactic utilized to conceal social inequality and displace blame, even more prevalent now that a Black man occupies the Whitehouse, Stic.man addresses the larger socioeconomic forces which often dictate and limit choices for the urban poor:

The same conditions that first created the drug problems still exist… / And on days off, we blow off them crumbs like nothing / Getting high cause a nigga gotta get into something / But we get trapped in a cycle of pain and addiction / And lose the motivation to change the condition… / How did Black life, my life, end up so hard?

He questions the entire wage system and bourgeois morality with piercing lines such as “got to go to the job or starve, without a gun every day employees get robbed.” Questioning whose interests are served in the perpetuation of the current system, he concludes that it’s “the police, lawyers, and judges, the private owned prison industry with federal budgets.” He ends with an unapologetic proclamation that the oppression of blacks is systemic, but oppressed communities cannot turn to individualized forms of escapism and instead must discuss the organization of society as it currently exists, “I blame it on the system but the problem is ours, it's not a question of religion; it's a question of power.” The call to a revolutionary alternative, although not always explicitly detailed, has been a persistent theme in the language of political rap. This, undoubtably, is due to the fact that many within the oppressed communities share Taylor’s conviction that the dynamic interrelationship between wealth, power, poverty, and the institutional forms in which oppression is manifested.

The landscape of independent, political hip-hop is constantly changing, progressing, and evolving. In the last few years, the augmentation of revolutionary hip-hop which aims to combat traditionally oppressive societal institutions and entrenched corporate structures provides a glimpse of the potential for the art’s future. Hip-hop’s place in politics extends far beyond a presidential election or congressional debates on explicit content; hip-hop, in the words of Dead Prez’s M-1, “means sayin’ what I want, never bitin’ my tongue / hip-hop means teachin’ the young.” Immortal Technique tells it like this, “I live and breathe Revolution, Rebellion is in my blood and Hip Hop is the heart that pumps it.” Two decades into the rap game, Paris provides a way forward with the newest single, “Don’t Stop the Movement,” from his independently owned label Guerrilla Funk:

Givin’ power to the people to take back America / Panic in the head of the state, pass the Derringer / Aim and shoot, Beruit to Bay Area… / Panther power, acid showers/ This land is ours, stand and shout it… / Hard truth revolutionary black militant / Death to the Minutemen, checks to the immigrants / Streets still feelin’ it, we still killin’ it / We still slaughterin’ hawks, feed the innocent / Read the imprint / Guerrilla Funk was birthed outta’ necessity, collectively / Respectively, to behead the beast / On behalf of the left wing scared to speak, NOW GET UP!

Expressing the need for solidarity between the struggles against militarism in the Middle East, black oppression in the U.S., and dehumanizing anti-immigration policies, the chorus warns activists to not stop the movement for social justice and liberation. It ends with a recording of the common protest chant which proclaims that “the people, united, will never be defeated.” KRS-One comments that hip-hop is the only place Dr. Martin Luther Kings dream is visible, “black, white, Asian, Latino, Chicano, everybody. Hip-hop has formed a platform for all people…that, to me, is beyond music.” As underground rap artist Macklemore urges his listeners, “to my real hip-hop heads, please stand up, because the only ones who can preserve this art is us.”

The battle continues to rage over hip-hop’s soul. Two contradictory forces clash to gain dominance: one representing the great wealth and power of the established order, the other struggling for independence, autonomy, and social change. Manning Marable makes the argument that “cultural workers,” such as hip-hop artists, “must be able to do more than rhyme about problems: they have got to be able to build organizations as well as harness the necessary monetary resources and political power to do something about them.” To answer the question of what role hip-hop will play in the formation of such revolutionary organizations and movements depends on which side wins, the power of profit or the power of the people. For hip-hop activists to rescue the art form from capitalism’s corporate clutches it will take dedication, organization, and education; time will tell if the hip-hop generation is up to this onerous task. The very essence of the culture is at stake.

WORKS CITED

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Folami, Akilah N. ,“From Habermas to ‘Get Rich or Die Trying’: Hip Hop, The Telecommunications Act of 1996, and the Black Public Sphere,” Michigan Journal of Race and Law, Vol. 12(June 2007) (Queens, NY: St. John’s University School of Law, 2007).

Hampton, Fred, “Murder of Fred Hampton, Reel 1,” accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://mediaburn.org/Video-Priview.128.0.html?uid=4192; Internet.

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, "The Message,” The Message, 1982, Sugar Hill.

Immortal Technique, “About Immortal Technique,” Myspace, accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://www.myspace.com/immortaltechnique; Internet.

Immortal Technique, "Death March" The 3rd World, 2008, Viper Records.

Immortal Technique, “Gangsta Rap is Hip Hop,” HipHopDX.com, accessed 5 April 2008; available from http://www.hiphopdx.com/index/columns-editorials/id.692/title.is-gangsta-rap-hip-hop-by-immortal-technique; Internet.

Immortal Technique, “Homeland and Hip Hop,” Revolutionary Vol. 2, 2003, Viper Records.

Immortal Technique, “Watch Out,” The 3rd World, 2008, Viper Records.

Jones, Brian, “Interview with Jeff Chang, Hip Hop Politics,” International Socialist Review, Issue 48, (July-August 2006), accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://www.isreview.org/issues/48/changinterview.shtml; Internet.

Jonathan Kozol, “Still Separate, Still Unequal: America’s Educational Apartheid,” Harper’s Magazine, Vol. 311, September 2005, accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2005/American-Apartheid-Education1sep05.htm; Internet.

Macklemore, “B-Boy,” The Language of My World, 2008, Integral Music Group.

Marable, Manning, “The Politics of Hip Hop,” World History Archives, accessed 5 April 2009; available from - http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/594.html; Internet.

MacCannell, Dean, In The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class (Schocken Book 1976). Cited in Folami, “The Telecommunications Act of 1996.”

Mason, Zach, “Hip Hop Speaks Out for Obama,” Socialist Worker, accessed 5 April 2009, available from http://socialistworker.org/2008/10/28/hip-hop-speaks-for-obama; Internet.

Naughty by Nature, “Chain Remains,” Poverty’s Paradise, 1995, Warner.

Nas, “Black President,” Untitled, 2008, Def Jam.

N.W.A., “Straight Outta Compton,” Straight Outta Compton, 1988, Ruthless/Priority.

N.W.A., “Fuck tha Police,” Straight Outta Compton, 1988, Ruthless/Priority.

Paris, “Bush Killa,” Sleeping With the Enemy, 1992, Scarface.

Paris, “Don’t Stop the Movement,” Acid Reflux, 2008, Guerrilla Funk.

Public Enemy, “Party For your Right to Fight,” It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, 1988, Def Jam/Columbia/CBS Records.

Rose, Tricia, Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America 27 (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1994).

Run-D.M.C., “It’s Like That,” Run-D.M.C., 1983, Profile/Arista Records.

Run-D.M.C., “Rock Box,” Run-D.M.C., 1983, Profile/Arista Records.

Run-D.M.C., “Wake Up,” Run-D.M.C., 1983, Profile/Arista Records.

Seale, Bobby, Seize the Time (Baltimore: Black Classic Press, 1997).

Son of Nun, “Son of Nun – Hip Hop Artist and Activist,” SleptOn Magazine, accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://www.slepton.com/slepton/viewcontent.pl?id=1955; Internet.

Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta, “Race in the Obama Era,” accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://socialistworker.org/2009/04/03/race-in-the-obama-era; Internet.

Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta, “Origins of Housing Discrimination,” International Socialist Review, Issue 59, (May-June 2008), accessed 5 April 2009; available from http://www.isreview.org/issues/59/letters.shtml; Internet.

Tupac Shakur, “Changes,” 2Pac’s Greatest Hits, 1998, Interscope Records.

Tupac Shakur, “Nothin’ But Love,” R U Still Down? (Remember Me), 1997, Jive.

Tupac Shakur, “Trapped,” 2Pacalypse Now, 1991, Jive.

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How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People's History of Political Rap (VI and V)

This is the third post covering the fourth and fifth section of my paper on hip-hop and the political and economic conditions under which it was fostered. Due to blog limitations, my footnotes are not included. However, I will post the Works Cited with the last post. Also, if anyone wants a PDF copy (around 35 pages, sort of long) I will be glad to e-mail them one.

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INDEX: How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People’s History of Political Rap

+ Introduction: Historical Phenomena, Hip-Hop Culture, and Rap Music
+ The South Bronx in the 1970’s and Material Conditions in Hip-Hop’s Birthplace
+ Afrocentricity, Black Power, and Hip-Hop’s New School
+ West Coast Projects, the Rise of Gangsta Rap, and Congress’s War on the Youth
+ Corporate Consolidation and the Telecommunications Act
+ Bursting Onto the Mainstream Scene and Contemporary Political Rap
+ Hip-Hop at a Crossroads: Conditions Today and Where Do We Go From Here?
+ Works Cited

Disclaimer: The language expressed in this article is an uncensored reflection of the views of the artists as they so chose to speak and express themselves. Censoring their words would do injustice to the freedom of expression and political content this article intends to explore. Therefore, some of the language appearing below may be offensive to personal, cultural, or political sensibilities.

----------------------------------------------

West Coast Projects, the Rise of Gangsta Rap, and Congress’s War on the Youth

Gangsta Rap burst forth in its nascent form in the late 1980’s in the heart of Los Angeles. To comprehend how this subgenre of rap developed, however, the ruthless conditions which originally produced the gang epidemic must be recognized. Institutionalized racial segregation, economic deprivation, and social degradation, enforced by hegemonic government and business structures, had historically plagued communities of color in the area and produced a distinct history which would give rise in the 1980’s to a prodigious spike in gang activity and violence. Historically marginalized groups would be pitted against one another in despondent economic conditions and forced to compete amongst themselves for the paltry scraps that fell from society’s table. Government departments, banking agencies, and the real estate industry would play into the game of get-rich-quick racial segregation. Redlining, the practice of denying or increasing costs of housing and insurance to economically segregate communities along racial lines, played a fundamental role in the homogenous racial composition of west coast urban areas. In 1938, the Federal Housing Administration released an underwriting manual which all lenders were forced to read, explaining that areas should be investigated in order to determine “the probability of the location being invaded” by “incompatible racial and social groups” and, more importantly, that for a “neighborhood is to retain stability” it must “be occupied by the same social and racial classes” because a change in these would lead to “instability and a decline in values.” Some entrepreneurs “figured out how to hustle racial fear” by buying at low prices from whites fleeing their homes and selling to blacks at prices significantly higher than market level. This effectively kept blacks and whites segregated into different neighborhoods.

After World War II, public housing projects were constructed, giving Watts the highest concentration of public housing on the West Coast. Combined with this historic segregation, the 1980’s brought with it “deindustrialization, devolution, Cold War adventurism, the drug trade, gang structures and rivalries, arms profiteering, and police brutality” which would combine to “destabilize poor communities and alienate massive numbers of youth.” In the same decade 131 manufacturing plants closed their doors, Los Angeles’s official unemployment was at 11 percent in 1983 and in South Central youth unemployment was over 50 percent, one quarter of Blacks and Latinos lived below the poverty line, and living conditions had drastically declined. Even when gangs attempted to make peace and establish long-standing treaties with one another, no infrastructure was in place to maintain stable communities with jobs and social services. In fact, when the leaders from seven rival gangs called a truce and marched to City Hall to request funding for social services, they were told they could apply for a paltry $500 grant. This denial was on top of the conservative economic agenda dominating the political domain at the time which had already cut spending on subsidized housing by 82 percent, job training and employment by 63 percent, and community service and development programs by 40 percent from post-World War II era progressive spending policies.

It was within these conditions that by the 1980’s, after the dismantling of political organizations such as the Black Panthers and Young Lords, 155 gangs would claim over 30,000 members across the city. Gangsta rap, as it was labeled, would attempt to articulate, and in some instances glorify, the street life so common in Los Angeles. Immortal Technique points out that a “factoid of information probably purposely forgotten through the years is that before it was labeled ‘Gangsta Rap’ by the industry itself it was called ‘Reality Rap’ by those individuals that created it.” Political prisoner and former Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal explains that the music was spawned by young people whom felt “that they are at best tolerated in schools, feared on the streets, and almost inevitably destined for the hell holes of prison. They grew up hungry, hated and unloved. And this is the psychic fuel that seems to generate the anger that seems endemic in much of the music and poetry.” This anger would shine through on tracks such as “Straight Outta Compton” by N.W.A., where rapper Ice Cube explains that he’s “From the gang called Niggaz With Attitudes” and “When I'm called off, I got a sawed off, squeeze the trigger, and bodies are hauled off!”

Their rhymes signified a shift from the revolutionary programs set forth by previous political rappers and instead focused on a complete self-indulgence in instant gratification; drugs, women, the murder of enemies and assassination of police, everything was fair game. It was N.W.A.’s track entitled “Fuck tha Police,” released in 1988, which garnered national media attention. The rather prophetic song would become a universal slogan in ghetto communities just four years later with the police beating of Rodney King and subsequent urban uprisings. Disgusted with the police brutality they witnessed regularly, N.W.A. would take up the issue, not politically, but with an individual vengeance and wrath previously unmatched. Beginning with fictitious court hearing in which “Judge Dre” would preside “in the case of NWA versus the police department,” the “prosecuting attorneys” MC Ren, Ice Cube, and Eazy E would each lay out their case against the Los Angeles Police Department. Ice Cube’s opening lines, brimming with unparalleled virulence, would set the tone: “Fuck the police comin’ straight from the underground, young nigga got it bad cuz I'm brown, and not the other color so police think, they have the authority to kill a minority.” Reminiscent of Paris’s earlier fantastical verbal assassination of President Bush, MC Ren would warn police “not to step in my path” because “Ren’s gonna blast,” and, turning the tables, he confidently proclaims his hatred towards the police “with authority, because the niggas on the street is a majority.” Eazy E finishes the last verse, emphasizing that fact that cops should not be perceived as immune to violent resistance: “Without a gun and a badge, what do ya got? A sucka in a uniform waitin’ to get shot.” The controversy revolving around this song would push the album it was featured on, Straight Outta Compton, to double platinum status. By June of 1989, the right-wing backlash against N.W.A. would be front page news, an entertainment manifestation of the “War on Gangs” which L.A. Police Chief Darryl Gates had already brought to South Central.

The atmosphere of late 1980’s was dictated by punitive measures explicitly directed at youth and relentless attacks on youth culture. The Street Terrorism Enforcement and Prevention Act was passed in 1988 and enhanced punishments for “gang-related offenses,” created “new categories of gang crimes,” and gave up to three years in state prison for even claiming gang membership. This piece of legislation had profoundly harmful repercussions for youth who identified with, or even may have displayed certain characteristics of, being involved with a gang; police considered any combination of two of the following examples to constitute gang membership: “slang, clothing of a particular color, pagers, hairstyles, or jewelry.” Within a decade most major cities and at least nineteen states had similar laws. The crossover into what became a congressional attack on Gangsta rap was facilitated by opportunistic politicians who pounced excitedly on the chance:

Tipper Gore, the wife of former vice president Al Gore, and Susan Baker, the wife of Bush’s former campaign manager, James Baker, formed Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) which called for, and received, a congressional hearing on record labeling. Every song listed by the PMRC and presented at the congressional hearing as being too explicit and obscene and in need of censorship labeling was done by a Black artist.

While politicians and networks of Christian fundamentalist groups had already begun anti-hip-hop campaigns under a guise of protecting morality, what Thompson labeled the “cultural civil war,” it was failed liberal politician and head of the National Political Congress of Black Women, C. Delores Tucker, who spearheaded the congressional war on Gangsta rap. Teaming up with cultural conservatives, Tucker, through a façade of feminism and racial pride, organized a concerted campaign against rap in order to push through legislation that strengthened juvenile-crime laws and crackdowns on youth. Inverting cause and effect, she argued that the hip-hop generation would become internalized “with the violence glorified in gangster rap” and that rap music created a “social time bomb” which would “trigger a crime wave of epidemic proportions,” only to be stopped by smothering the cultural and musical developments of ghetto youth.

Among some of her chief targets was Tupac Shakur (2Pac), who was not quiet in his opposition to Tucker and her political opportunism. Tupac, staying true to his roots on “Nothin’ But Love,” outlines the composition of his family tree as one of “Panthers, pimps, pushers, and thugs;” this unique mixture helped him to articulate a conception of the rebellious ghetto lifestyle blended with the legacy of black struggle into what he termed “Thug Life.” An acronym, which stood for “The Hate U Gave Little Infants Fucks Everybody,” his idea of “Thug Life” was a “new kind of Black Power” that young black males were forced to live through:

These white folks see us as thugs, I don’t care if you a lawyer, a man, an ‘African-American,’ if you whatever…you think you are, we thugs and niggas [to them]…and until we own some shit, I’ma call it like it is. How you gonna be a man when we starving?...How we gonna be African-Americans if we all need a gun?

Tupac, whose mother Afeni Shakur was a prominent Black Panther and political activist, would utilize his connections with the streets and balance his music with historical connections to political organizers such as Huey Newton and chilling urban tales of despondent situations such as the fictitious tale of the teenage mother Brenda and the ever-present black-on-black violence. Through this unification of social commentator and street participant, Tupac would authenticate his image to millions of youth, black and white alike. Tupac’s response to Tucker’s critique of the lyrical content of his music was redolent of Chuck D’s interpretation of rappers as journalists who help to show the world the gruesome reality of urban street life; as he argued, “I have not brought violence to you. I have not brought Thug Life to America. I didn’t create Thug Life. I diagnosed it.”

Furthermore, according to Dyson, the attempt to suppress “gangsta rap’s troubling expressions” is manipulated for “narrow political ends” that fail to “critically engage…artists and the provocative issues they address.” While dialogue concerning rampant homophobia, sexism, and other dehumanizing aspects of certain rap artists should be challenged, it should be done so in a way that does not alienate and isolate, but engages and allows for the artist to transcend both actions that reflect the dominant ideology and the use of oppressive language. Rapper and activist Son of Nun summarizes his position:

Some real rappers spit truth every night, but say stupid shit when it comes to gay rights. They talk about the Panthers, but they never knew that Huey woulda’ called their asses out for what they do…So, in my music, I try not to call out specific emcees…[because] I realize that I have more in common with them, then I'll ever have in common with the label head or the corporate people putting that music out… [Despite sexist or homophobic remarks] when you read the interview and listen to some lyrics, you'll see that there's a revolutionary consciousness that's there at the same time…and I'd rather see those brothers as my comrades whom I can build with, as opposed to people I need to chop down and diss…

This extension of the right-wing economic attack on working class and poor youth into the cultural realm, as exemplified by politicians like Tucker, should not be viewed in isolation from the larger historical trends occurring at the same time; it operated within a certain political economy and aided the perpetuation the dominant ideology required in order to push through neoliberal economic policies.

The mental framework in which Gangsta rap functions is articulated by Immortal Technique, drawing on the theoretical contributions to education outlined in Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, he explains, “Our youth and young adults see these gangstas and other ruthless men [famous gangsters, drug kingpins, etc.] as powerful beyond the scope of a government that holds them prisoner. People emulate their oppressor and worship those that defy him openly.” This does not, however, mean that Gangsta rap is devoid of a political foundation or that it should be ostracized by the Hip-hop community. As Dyson argues, “While rappers like N.W.A. perform an invaluable service by rapping in poignant and realistic terms about urban underclass existence, they must be challenged…[to understand] that description alone is insufficient to address the crises of black urban life.” Thus, this fusion of gangster and rebel, a sort of misguided revolutionary, groping in the darkness of urban decay and abandonment for a way to challenge oppressive, hegemonic institutions, finds its musical expression in the West Coast rap scene. Today, gangsta rap has spread far beyond the streets of L.A. and into every neighborhood, ghetto, suburb, country, to every corner of the world. The rebellious, gangster appeal, devoid of social content and reality, continues to be marketed on every street corner; a sort of “manufactured, corporate bought thug image” is pushed to the youth while “the Revolutionary element is for the most part completely sanitized by the corporate structure.”

Corporate Consolidation and the Telecommunications Act

This rejection of the revolutionary and embrace of the thug caricature so common in contemporary hip-hop is, in large part, a result of corporate monopolization of radio airwaves and dismantling of independent record labels. For years questions concerning rap’s viability as a musical genre and it’s viability as a pop music sensation surrounded the relatively young art. Industry executives looked upon rap with disdain, viewing it as a niche market unsuitable for broad consumption. This allowed the genre to slip under corporate radar and maintain a sense of independence from major pop labels for a significant period of time. After the innovative development in 1991 of SoundScan that utilized bar-code recording to garner hard data on music sales and replaced the previous “archaic method” which had relied on the retail personnel who compiled weekly, subjective reports of sales trends “open to interpretation,” rap was found to have a much broader appeal than originally thought. With this new, more objective methodology of measuring music consumption, rap jumped from the relative obscurity of being a subcultural phenomenon to a major competitor with rock and pop music on the Billboard charts. The “underreporting of rap was a result of long-standing cultural sensibilities and racial assumptions” on the part of retail personnel. Subsequently, industry executives who still may have “harbored ill feelings toward the genre” could no longer “ignore the sales data SoundScan provided…[or] the huge financial payoff it offered.” As hip hop observer and critic Craig Watkins explains, “In an industry that had long ago sold its soul to the guardians of capitalism, the commercial compulsions that operate among culture industry executives are a powerful force.” The music, however, would have to be tamed considerably.

These commercial compulsions galvanized industry executives to tighten their stranglehold on rap music. In order to protect their status within the capitalist framework and pop music industry, executives were forced to marginalize and reject progressive, dissident, revolutionary, socialist, or any other form of independent and autonomous rap that may present a systemic critique of the established relations of power in society. Corporate hip-hop, as exemplified with the rise of rappers like 50 Cent in 2003, “rested almost entirely on its ability to sell black death” where “guns, gangsterism, and ghetto authenticity brought an aura of celebrity and glamour to the grim yet fabulously hyped portraits of ghetto life.” Statistics are not conclusive, but Mediamark Research Inc. estimates that whites constitute around sixty percent of the consumer market for rap in the United States. Other sources, such as Def Jam CEO Russell Simmons, place the number somewhere closer to eighty percent. Regardless, it is obvious that hip-hop is not an exclusively black culture; the composition of the consumer market facilitates a sort of “cultural tourism” where a “staged authenticity” filled with racial stereotypes of black culture can be marketed to white youth.

Corporate consolidation of media outlets has galvanized this process of promoting a certain image of ghetto youth while downplaying the revolutionary or counter-hegemonic sentiments expressed in the music. Major labels and corporate conglomerates have very little interest in promoting artists who question capitalism or the free market fundamentalism. After all, it was that very system which originally granted them the ability to garner the enormous capital required to build their constantly expanding media empire. Immortal Technique articulates this concept:

The hood is not stupid, we know the mathematics / I make double what I would going gold on Atlantic / 'Cause EMI, Sony, BMG, Interscope / Would never sign a rapper with the white house in his scope / They push pop music like a religion / Anorexic celebrity driven / Financial fantasy fiction.

Without an understanding of the significant role that major media outlets play in promoting a specific paradigm, especially in the case of a popular musical juggernaut such as rap, the rise of the glorified, gangster image cannot be concretely analyzed. Chang comments that “a lot of times people will talk about 50 Cent, but they won't talk about the structures that have made a 50 Cent possible.” The structures Chang refers to are multifaceted, and include broad neoliberal market deregulations that, since the 1970’s, allowed for massive corporate takeovers of independent record labels and a consolidation of radio and other media outlets. For instance, by 2000, five companies – Vivendi Universal, Sony, AOL Time Warner, Bertelsmann, and EMI – dominated eighty percent of the music industry. One act in particular, however, the Telecommunications Act passed by Congress in 1996, presented “a landmark of deregulation,” a “legal codification of the pro-media monopoly stance” that allowed the free market to shift power “decisively in the direction of the media monopolies.” The passage of this act had a percussive impact on the artists’ creative control over their music.

The Telecommunications Act relaxed ownership limits over radio and television for corporate entities, essentially creating fewer corporate conglomerates with concentrated control over various media outlets. Congress ostensibly passed the act under the tenuous postulation that “a deregulated marketplace would best serve the public interest.” As to be expected, its passage spurred a rapid absorption of smaller, local radio stations into the hands of large, already established companies such as Clear Channel, Cumulus, Citadel, and Viacom. The result was that hundreds of jobs were decimated, community programming was abandoned, and radio playlists became standardized across the country. For a stations like KMEL-FM in the Bay Area, whom prided themselves on being a “people’s station” by engaging in social issues affecting the San Francisco community, this meant being bought out and merged with competing stations; playlists became nearly identical, specialty shows were cut, local personalities were fired, and local or underground artists “unable to compete with six-figure major label marketing budgets” were left without a venue. Artists like Binary Star, who challenged the gangster caricature, would become, even more than before, systematically excluded by these corporate structures. Rhymes, such as those displayed on one of Binary Star’s most well-known tracks “Honest Expression,” would be consistently ostracized from airplay.

Conglomerates like Clear Channel, unlike locally controlled radio, had no community affairs department to foster dialogue or promote local artists with fresh sounds or unique lyrics. Companies downsized to maximize profits and regional programmers overtook local ones, signifying a further shift from local interests of listeners. The ever-present need to increase profitability also galvanized some stations to replace live disc jockeys with prerecorded announcers who would create localized sound bites and patch together entire shows based upon a master copy that was filtered down through regional and local distributors; radio truly became top-down. Subsequently, the public sphere in which artists could contest the image of the apolitical gangster or socially devoid party-goer shrunk rapidly. Corporate rap became a medium through which content was filtered and sterilized while dissident voices were marginalized or shut out completely. Even political rap was reworked into a specific consumer niche; “defanged as ‘conscious rap,’ and retooled as an alternative hip-hop lifestyle,” the prefix became “industry shorthand for reaching a certain kind of market” instead of an authentic, organic title.

Thus, as is the trend in a capitalist society where the “market...does not assure that all relevant views will be heard, but only those that are advocated by the rich [and can market a product of mass appeal that will attract advertisers, which dominate the programming message],” the Telecommunications Act has had profoundly negative implications upon hip-hop’s autonomy and ensured that the media landscape was “dominated by those who are economically powerful.” Likewise, the prodigious increase in corporate consolidation facilitated the process by which consumption could be artificially managed and manipulated by the “mass media’s capacity to convey imagery and information across vast areas to ensure a production of demand.” Therefore, the exclusion of particular forms of musical expression, especially those deemed political or controversial, are replaced with corporate-driven, marketed images of young black males adhering to a socially constructed thug stereotype. Fokami explains:

Corporations which dominate the media, have heavily marketed (to influence consumer demand), produced and perpetuated, the gangsta image by, among other things, playing gangsta rap lyrics, almost to the exclusion of other alternative voices that would contest such lyrics or image... The Act has made it virtually impossible for alternative voices in rap (either by the gangsta rappers themselves through their alternative “positive” tracks or by other “positive” rap artists) to be heard on the radio, since corporate conglomerates are less concerned with diversity in ideas but in meeting market created consumer demand for such lyrics.

While congressional attacks were pummeling rap music for degrading lyrical content and demeaning music videos, the same politicians were simultaneously passing laws which facilitated the crystallization of apolitical, socially devoid gangsta rap into mainstream pop culture. This apparently blatant contradiction is, when viewed in the context of the capitalist state, much more consistent than at first glance; the political establishment sought to promote corporate consolidation and media monopolization, thus limiting public space for dialogue and debate in the hip-hop community, which, in turn, allowed them to pursue a the preferable path of blaming the victims for society’s woes. Avoiding an uncomfortable and possibly incriminating dialectical analysis which would address the root cause, namely the dominant political and economic system, that perpetuates many of the social blights expressed in rap music, politicians attack the youth, especially Black and Latino youth, for problems that plagued urban communities long before rap music hit the scene.

How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People's History of Political Rap (III)

This is the second post covering the third section of my paper on hip-hop and the political and economic conditions under which it was fostered. Due to blog limitations, my footnotes are not included. However, I will post the Works Cited with the last post. Also, if anyone wants a PDF copy (around 35 pages, sort of long) I will be glad to e-mail them one.

----------------------------------------------

INDEX: How Capitalism Underdeveloped Hip-Hop: A People’s History of Political Rap

+ Introduction: Historical Phenomena, Hip-Hop Culture, and Rap Music
+ The South Bronx in the 1970’s and Material Conditions in Hip-Hop’s Birthplace
+ Afrocentricity, Black Power, and Hip-Hop’s New School
+ West Coast Projects, the Rise of Gangsta Rap, and Congress’s War on the Youth
+ Corporate Consolidation and the Telecommunications Act
+ Bursting Onto the Mainstream Scene and Contemporary Political Rap
+ Hip-Hop at a Crossroads: Conditions Today and Where Do We Go From Here?
+ Works Cited

Disclaimer: The language expressed in this article is an uncensored reflection of the views of the artists as they so chose to speak and express themselves. Censoring their words would do injustice to the freedom of expression and political content this article intends to explore. Therefore, some of the language appearing below may be offensive to personal, cultural, or political sensibilities.

----------------------------------------------

Afrocentricity, Black Power, and Hip-Hop’s New School

Hip Hop was originally honed in house parties, parks, community centers, and local clubs by pioneers such as DJ Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, and Grandmaster Flash. Independent record labels were quick to pick up on the enormous buzz generated by this new street sound. Small record executives, with their ears to the street, realized that “there were potentially many more millions of fans out there for the music,” but they needed a way to push it from the traditional arenas where spontaneity reigned into the lab where Hip-hop could be researched, developed, and put into radio rotation. Rap had to “fit the standards of the music industry” and labels had to pursue methods which in which they could “rationalize and exploit the new product” to “find, capture, package, and sell its essence…Six-man crews would drop to two. Fifteen-minute party-rocking raps would become three-minute ready-for-radio singles. Hip-hop was refined like sugar.” The laws of capitalism dictated that the art form had to be commodified, manufactured, and sold to a market. After the initial commercial success of “Rapper’s Delight” and “The Message,” corporate encroachment would quickly invade Hip-hop sovereignty. This seminal musical format would act as a medium through which two distinct worlds would mesh; young, black youth who aspired to spit rhymes and find a way out of their seemingly despondent condition would be introduced to nascent white record executives, opening what ostensibly appeared as new, untested feasibilities to previously marginalized artists. As early Hip-hop head and B-boy Richie “Crazy Legs” Colon would comment, “it was getting us into places that we never thought we could get into. So there was an exchange there... [but] that was also the beginning of us getting jerked…that’s a reality.”

The struggle over control of the culture would be a reminiscent theme for the next decade. Dissident rap presenting a critique of the political economy would briefly touch mainstream society in the early and mid 1980’s before being stifled and ostracized. In the next few years, the crossover of rap acts like Run-D.M.C. and the rise of overtly political rap groups such as Public Enemy, along with lesser known but highly controversial artists such as Paris, would trigger intense debate over the nature of Hip-hop and the direction it was headed. Passing from the pioneering old-school, a new era of Hip-hop would develop consisting of a fresh blend of Afrocentricity, cultural nationalism, calls for a neo-Black power, and a focus on the African diaspora. It would delve into the questions of race and racism and the legacy of slavery, along with a critique of institutionalized forms of oppression and ideas of what methods could adequately challenge them. It also presented artists with the first taste of corporate control over creative expression, a tension that would remain a prominent theme throughout the history of rap music. Any definite time frame would only succeed in confining the progression of Hip-hop into arbitrary, categorical stages that lack accurate representation of the often overlapping and dynamic evolutionary process of the art. However, in the mid 1980’s it became apparent that rap was burgeoning into uncharted territory.

Afrocentric rap, advocating a unique mix of cultural nationalism and Pan-Africanism, can trace its roots to Afrika Bambaataa and the Zulu Nation, an organization of reformed gang members who attempted to take back their streets through the creation of innovative cultural outlets, many of which would develop into early Hip-hop culture. Bambaata “started to believe that the energy, loyalty, and passion that defined gang life could be guided toward more socially productive activities…he saw an opportunity to combine his love of music and B-boying with his desire to enhance community life.” After some initial musical success, however, tensions began to mount between Bambaataa and the man who signed him, Tom Silverman, founder of the independent label Tommy Boy Records. Bambaataa recounts, “The record companies would try to tell us what we should make, what we should do…We said, ‘Listen, we’re the renegades, we sing what we want to sing, dress how we want to dress, and say what we want to say.” This sort of outright resistance to artist manipulation worked for a time, when artists dealt primarily with small, independent stations during the nascent stages of Hip-hop’s development. Later, however, when the corporate structures completely enveloped the art, it would be nearly impossible to individually challenge such enormous institutions.

Queens rap trio Run-D.M.C. “is widely recognized as the progenitor of modern rap’s creative integration of social commentary, diverse musical elements, and uncompromising cultural identification” into what would become known as the New School of Hip-hop. Fueled by Jam Master Jay’ complex, percussive beats and brilliant lyrical deliverance, Run-D.M.C. would burst into the mainstream by signing a distributing deal with Colombia records. Bridging the gap between rap and rock, Run-D.M.C. appealed to a wide range of audiences from rugged, street hustlers to well-to-do white kids in a desperate search to branch out from the cultural confinement of suburbia. As their album Raising Hell rushed to platinum status, they catapulted rap music into mainstream discourse and charted a new path for commercial success. The group presented an interesting dynamic where, challenging corporate-driven consumerism with lines such as “Calvin Klein’s no friend of mine, don’t want nobody’s name on my behind,” they simultaneously promoted a specific style of apparel with tracks such as “My Adidas” that would break with previous, flashily clad rap artists and forever tie Hip-hop’s look to the styles of the street. Raising Hell would end with “Proud to Be Black,” a track emphasizing African history and the struggle against slavery while documenting the historical progress of black people. Involving themselves in specific struggles or causes, such as doing benefit performances for the anti-Apartheid struggle, they did not shy away from political issues.

On “Wake Up,” the trio echoed calls for democratic participation of the masses, full employment, fair wages, and an end to racial prejudice that would be familiar to any socialist activist. They provided a glimpse of the shape a truly humanizing society could take:

There were no guns, no tanks, no atomic bombs / and to be frank homeboy, there were no arms… / Between all countries there were good relations / there finally was a meaning to United Nations / and everybody had an occupation / 'cause we all worked together to fight starvation… / Everyone was treated on an equal basis / No matter what color, religion or races / We weren't afraid to show our faces / It was cool to chill in foreign places… / All cities of the world were renovated / And the people all chilled and celebrated / They were all so happy and elated / To live in the world that they created… / And every single person had a place to be / A job, a home, and the perfect pay…

The song is haunted by the chorus proclaiming that all the hopes and desires for the fanciful world articulated are “just a dream.” The group switches gears on “It’s Like That,” citing unemployment, atrocious wages, ever-increasing bills, and the struggle to survive within the confines of a capitalist political economy. At the end of each verse they communicate their prodigious frustration manifested from the despair and helplessness prevalent in oppressed communities, leaving the listener with little hope for change: “Don't ask me, because I don't know why, but it's like that, and that's the way it is!” Grand ideals aside, Run-D.M.C. ultimately did not pursue a confrontational approach to the dominant institutions in society and, thus, their commercial success in part reflects their desire to integrate into the established system rather than attempt to dismantle the established structures.

Ideas of collective social change would be articulated more thoroughly by artists such as Public Enemy. Coming from a relatively well-to-do, although still highly segregated, post-white flight neighborhood, Public Enemy’s ambitions were to “be heard as the expression of a new generation’s definition of blackness.” As opposed to artists who may record a political song or sneak a witty, politically charged punch line into a mainstream hit, Public Enemy would focus entire albums around counter-hegemonic themes reflecting their constantly evolving political philosophy. Their Black Nationalist ideology did not go unnoticed in their first album, but it would augment over time as the group developed their own conception of a new Black Power. On It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back and Fear of a Black Planet they delved deeply into race relations, the oppression of the black community at home and abroad, and brought into question entire institutions of society they viewed as perpetuating racism. The group also spoke openly of their support for Palestinian liberation and against U.S. imperialism. On “Bring the Noise,” they challenged black radio to play their music and on “Party for Your Right to Fight” they evoked images of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Black Panther Party in a “pro-Black radical mix” while aiming verbal invectives at J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI for their historically repressive roles against the black community.

Public Enemy undoubtedly pushed political hip-hop to a new level. Their intense, in-your-face rhymes promoted a historical revival amongst black youth previously separated from prior cultural developments and struggles of the past. However, as Dyson points out, this can lead to rappers hoping to emulate the methods of the past without a critical analysis of its strengths and weaknesses or, worse yet, to promoting vacuous calls to past movements’ cultural icons intended to draw reverence without attempting to augment the organizational infrastructure required to proactively challenge oppressive institutions. Still, given the tyrannical nature of the society in which they lived, the group labeled themselves “the Black Panthers of rap” as a symbolic expression of their hostility towards the system. However, the framework within which they operated, borrowing large portions of their theoretical interpretation of society to the Nation of Islam and Louis Farrakhan, did not allow them to adopt the Panthers’ revolutionary, socialist critique of the political economy. It was replaced instead with a form of black militancy aligned primarily with a narrow conception of Black Nationalism. Public Enemy would drastically differ from the Panthers who had come to reject Black Nationalism as a racist philosophy, aiming their crosshairs more broadly on capitalism and arguing racism was a byproduct of that particular economic mode of production. Regardless, Public Enemy’s prodigious contributions to political hip-hop cannot be ignored. They fostered political discussion and pushed hip-hop to embrace black liberation. Yet, they would fail propose a cohesive, theoretical alternative or method through which this could be achieved.

Other times, political hip-hop took the form of cathartic, impulsive depictions of violence stemming from the wrath manifested within oppressed black communities. One example, Oakland rapper Paris, who adhered early in his career to a form of Black Nationalism similar to Public Enemy’s, would seek a sort of lyrical revenge against individuals and institutions he found oppressive and exploitative. Through songs like “Bush Killa,” where he fantasized about assassinating then President George H. Bush, he would decisively embrace a black militancy that challenged the past legacy of King’s non-violence: “So don’t be tellin’ me to get the non-violent spirit, 'cause when I’m violent is the only time you devils hear it!” Later in the song he goes on to poignantly express his disgust with the predatory nature of military recruitment while uniquely mimicking the famous line from Muhammad Ali, “Yeah, tolerance is gettin’ thinner, ‘cause Iraq never called me nigger, so what I wanna go off and fight a war for?” Presumably due to the radical nature of his music, Paris was dropped from his record label, Tommy Boy, after parent company Time Warner reviewed the content of his album. He distanced himself from the Nation of Islam, and thought that they were “more concerned with what was wrong with society than with how to change it.” Nearly two decades later, and still rapping under his own label, Paris would go on to develop a political stance that, while still bonded to certain aspects of his previous Black Nationalist thought, would become decidedly more working-class in its orientation, emphasizing class struggle and interracial solidarity rather than a simple black-white dichotomy.

The 1980’s were, undoubtedly, a time of creativity, diversity, and cultural exploration within the musical realm of Hip-hop. Artists even tested the waters with politically significant album covers. Paris placed a potent photo of riot police choking a black protestor in his 1989 release Break the Grip of Shame. Rapper KRS-One, paraphrasing Malcolm X on his album title By All Means Neccesary (1988), poses on the front cover in a fashion reminiscent of Malcolm’s famous photograph; Malcolm, standing with AK-47 in his right arm and peering out of the drapes with his left, symbolized the vision of armed self-defense and intellectual self-determination. KRS-One, adorned in a fashionable outfit and carrying a more contemporary Uzi, personified these principles Malcolm so vehemently defended throughout his life. Chuck D of Public Enemy explains, given the group’s extensive list of politically charged album covers, that sometimes “the covers were thought out more than the songs.” Corporate control was illuminated in this artistic arena as well when hip-hop trio KMD attempted to release an album titled Black Bastards which featured a “Little Sambo” character being hung; Elektra, their label, quietly rejected the album and its politically charged album artwork.

Some rappers, such as Rakim, toyed with abstract ideas of personal and spiritual development, meshed with political Islam and the elitist vision of the Five Percenters, a group who believed that a gifted five percent of the world’s population was destined to fight against the exploitative ten percent on behalf of the ignorant, backwards eighty-five percent. Others, like rap group Naughty by Nature, found unique ways to tie in urban culture and style to the historic legacies of the past. On one of the group’s most political tracks, “Chain Remains,” rapper Treach vividly explicates on the cultural significance of the chain commonly worn by black, urban youth, tying it into the past history of slavery and the prison-industrial complex:

Bars and cement instead of help for our people / Jails ain't nothin’ but the slave day sequel / Tryin’ to flee the trap of this nation / Seein’ penitentiary's the plan to plant the new plantation… / Free? Please, nigga, ain't no freedom! / Who's locked up? Who's shot up? Who's strung out? Who's bleeding? Keep reading / I'm here to explain the chain remain the same / Maintain for the brothers and sisters locked / The chain remains…

The last verse ends with an incendiary call to revolution, although the terms for which are not specifically outlined: “the only solutions revolution, know we told ya’, the chain remains ‘til we uprise, stuck in a land where we ain't meant to survive.” Despite calls for racial solidarity and social empowerment, the violence found in poverty-stricken urban areas often followed artists into the realm of entertainment.

When violence broke out at various rap venues in 1987, the hip-hop community was quick to respond with a Stop the Violence Movement. A group of artists organized a project “that would include a benefit record, video, book, and a rally around the theme.” On the record “Self Destruction,” a wide assortment of rappers came together to urge black youth to “crush the stereotype” and “unite and fight for what's right,” by stopping the senseless violence that plagued the black community. Unfortunately, it was not a sustained political campaign and, as Jeff Chang argues, Stop the Violence “was always less a movement than a media event.” KRS-One, re-launching the Stop the Violence 2008 campaign in a similar fashion, disagrees, claiming Chang’s interpretation is “inaccurate history and fake scholarship.” Regardless, media event or movement, Stop the Violence provided another example of rappers attempting to take control of their communities and control their own destinies.

New School Hip Hop was defined by its seminal, independent spirit of artists’ attempts to maneuver within the confines of an ever-increasing hierarchal, corporate, top-down structure. Indeed, as Chang notes, “Rap proved to be the ideal form to commodify the hip-hop culture. It was endlessly novel, reproducible, malleable, perfectible. Records got shorter, raps more concise, and tailored to pop-song structures.” The infrastructure needed to solidify corporate power over the culture was being rapidly built but originality and autonomy would not yet be completely shattered. The day would soon come, however, when creativity and free political expression would be stomped out and replaced with denigrating images of black men, as self-destructive gangsters and intellectually bankrupt drug-pushers, and black women, whose sole contribution is their sexual appeal, vigorously promoted by the dominant ideology. Generally, during this period artists would attempt to hold on “to the Black Panther ethic of remaining true to Blackness… to the people in the lower classes” while, on the other hand, rejecting the Party’s anti-capitalist stance; “Rappers wanted a piece of the American pie while staying grounded to the urban culture, and wanted to speak in their own voice and on their own terms.” Given the political, social, and economic conditions of the mid-1980’s, this was no surprise.

The sort of individualistic response exemplified by New School artists was developed within the context of a detrimental political vacuum left by the simultaneous failure and systematic repression of revolutionary left groups of the 1960’s and early 1970’s. Instead of political organizers, rappers would view themselves as reporters whose primary vocation was to give the voiceless a form of expression and relay the conditions of ghetto life to the rest of the world. Public Enemy articulated this concept when he explained that rap was “Black America’s CNN, an alternative, youth-controlled media network.” Tupac would echo this concept, “I just try to speak about things that affect me and our community. Sometimes I’m the watcher, and sometimes the participant,” he commented, and likening himself to reporters during the Vietnam War, he explicated on his role, “That’s what I’ll do as an artist, as a rapper. I’m gonna show the graphic details of what I see in my community and hopefully they’ll stop it.” Rather than broad-reaching, collective social change achieved through organized resistance, rap music would act as a means to express counter-hegemonic, yet radically individualized forms of resistance that captured the very essence of the urban youth existence. This concept would be carried further into the realm of musical performance:

Rap…found an arena in which to concentrate its subversive cultural didacticism aimed at addressing racism, classism, social neglect, and urban pain: the rap concert, where rappers are allowed to engage in ritualistic refusals of censored speech. The rap concert also creates space for cultural resistance and personal agency, losing the strictures of the tyrannizing surveillance and demoralizing condemnation of mainstream society and encouraging relatively autonomous, often enabling, forms of self-expression and cultural creativity.

It was this anti-authoritarian impulse, fostered in the hard streets of Los Angeles where police brutality was rampant and socioeconomic conditions were dire, that galvanized the next phase of Hip-hop which would take the nation by storm.