HYPOTHESIS:Has the exploitation of women and materialistic values in the genre of rap music videos become a requirement for black hip hop artists in order to gain a sense of identity, image and power?
The criticism of the way rap music portrays women is nothing new. Ever since it’s formation in the 1970's, and even more so to this day there has been criticism for its negative portrayal of women. Despite people’s beliefs that women are supposedly rising in status throughout the media, this does not seem to be true within the rap and hip-hop industry. “The most powerful and influential part of hip-hop culture has come to be rap music, a form of poetry that is said over musical instrumentation. In recent years rap music has developed a reputation of being brutally honest, violent, and misogynistic”[1] Shocking and explicit lyrics have resulted in rap artists being charged with indecent conduct.
The young audience of mainly teenage boys said to be influenced by such negative representations, has created controversy around the question of exactly where and who the blame now lies with. Perhaps the rap music industry is to blame for intentionally tapping into the male minds desire for authority, image and dominance, as a result of poverty, racism and discrimination. This has not only made such behaviour fashionable for young men, but also empowering for them to degrade women in this way. Through this study I aim to uncover the reasons why men in rap find it necessary to gain a sense of power through indulging in the very acts that earn women in hip-hop their derogatory labels. Some would describe them as ‘merely token females’[2] for the rappers.
In an industry where females are frequently referred to as ‘hoes’ and ‘bitches, it doesn’t come as a surprise to most that many negative stereotypes and conventions have been established and widely accepted by the rap industry. The publicity and controversy that has developed as a result of this consistent and overt disregard towards the feelings of women in hip hop, has almost created a certain criteria that is now expected of the industry, by its audience. When a few specific characteristics begin to re-appear within a genre with growing persistence, I believe to an extent that the viewer of that particular text or genre are likely to be influenced by the ideologies being pressed forward. A similar idea was also recognised by Patrick Philips, who identified that recurring factors and qualities were crucial in order for any text to have an effect on its audience. The thing that he argued to be the reason for this sort of behaviour is “the audiences demand for predictability.”[3] A set of recurring conventions are existent in hip hop videos which create a predictable nature. There are a set of conventions that the industry knows are vital in maintaining its viewers interests in the genre, otherwise why would such negative portrayals continue to exist?
All of the recurring conventions that are present within the stereotypical rap video expose women in a degrading way. I believe that there are several core elements that can be recognized in a mainstream hip hop video. Firstly the sexual exploitation of women through promiscuous behaviour and provocative clothing has created a reputation of negative publicity for rap videos. Gaye Tuchman argued that when women were actually given roles in society, they were mostly in danger of being negatively portrayed, she described this as “The symbolic annihilation of women in the mass media”[4] This philosophy seemed to reflect the current roles of females in rap music as sex objects at worst, and ‘eye candy’ at best. The males so called desire to be dominant over women is an aspect which represents hip hop as a patriarchal society, as the presence of a male protagonist is a principle which applies to every rap song or video. The strong importance placed on materialistic items within the music and explicit lyrics is another convention which does not lack any presence in rap. Rap artists have evolved the way in which they write lyrics and the issues which they address. Fans used to be able to relate to and appreciate the things that rappers would talk about in their music as it usually had some meaning behind it, but it now seems that these values have died out. They used to rap about real life situations that concern vast amounts of regular people such as struggles of life, poverty, violence and love, but whatever it was it always had some true relevance and importance to society, and meant something to both them and their fans. It has become apparent now that the image put forward by rappers in their lyrics has changed substantially. Evidently they would rather discuss the large amounts of money that they generate off exploitation and issues which their fans cannot relate to in order to please their record labels. They create unrealistic representations of the good life through the use of women as recognised in many rap lyrics, for example in 50 cent’s ‘PIMP’ song he says “She feed them foolish fantasies, they pay her cause they wanna”[5]
It is thanks to an inappropriate attitude that is so openly embraced by the industry, which has to some extent resulted in the dehumanisation of women and transformed them in to inferior devices for men within the industry to exert their power over. However, the women are not the only ones who appear under pressure to act in a certain way. The youth of today are under an enormous amount of pressure due to unhelpful and irresponsible marketing from the rap business. "What sort of personal values do little girls in our hip-hop nation develop when they are constantly bombarded with images of their future selves as little more than rump shakers? What do our little boys learn when a disproportionate number of rap videos portray their sisters, mothers, future wives and future daughters as little more than eye candy?"[6] Particularly, black rap artists have chosen to portray their work through a mostly narrow-minded approach, compared to those of ethnic backgrounds who tend to create a more diverse and individual image of themselves. It is this common representation of black rap artists that has resulted in the many negative conceptions and stereotypes that exist in hip hop music today.
As well as males being pressurised to exploit women in order to gain a sense of dominance, women are under just as much pressure to be sexually appealing in order to gain a sense of feeling successful. This understanding about women is also suggested by Greer as stated in his own words, “Every woman knows that she is a failure if she is not beautiful”[7] Although some might argue that rap has lost its moral values, the stereotypes have helped to generate huge amounts of financial income for rappers and added great market value to its trade. However, they have not benefited what so ever in terms of being a successful art form, but instead focussed on what sells even if it means sacrificing its ethical standards that once existed in rap music.
“Hip-hop culture is frequently condemned for its misogynistic exploitation of women, but this misogyny has its roots in the culture in which we live.”[8] Misogynistic values are being heavily pushed in the rap/hip hop genre today a great deal more than in the past. Although the industry does to an extent have a lot to be held accountable for, I feel that it should not have to bear the blame entirely. Neither should it all be left responsible to the male genders lack of self-confidence nor a so-called thirst for power or dominance over women. However it must also be considered that a lot of the exploitation is with consent from the females who actually appear in these videos (in the form of groupies) whose own reputations seem to be tarnished as a result. Joan Morgan who refers to herself as a ‘Hip Hop feminist’ also stated that a “significant amount of misogynistic hip-hop consumers are women, and hundreds of bikini-donned women show up for the music video shoots as unpaid participants”[9]. Although groupies in the 60's were all mainly white while today they are somewhat multiracial, they function in hip hop in exactly the same way as they did in the rock era, they are simply women whose purpose it is to provide sexual services for their heroes (rappers). Though there were groupies within the jazz, blues and rock genres, they were not as noticeable or outrageous as those who exist within the current state of hip hop. The reason for this is that singers in the past did not blatantly portray or refer to the women in a negative manner, whereas Hip Hop does the complete opposite by disrespecting and degrading women in both its lyrics, videos and imagery. What makes the whole issue even more shocking is that women are reacting in a way as if they are in full support of these ideologies being imposed by their intimidator (the male rapper). Does it give women a sense of recognition and power also? “The lyrics of many early female blues songs subverted the fact that female sexuality was only the object of the male desire.”[10]
This sense of dominance being gained by the man from observing women as sex shares identical comparisons to the theory of ‘Male Gaze’[11] A term used by Laura Mulvey in her "Visual Pleasures and Narrative Cinema" to describe what she saw as “the male point of view adopted by the camera for the benefit of an assumed male audience.”[12] She described women in this essay as ‘the bearer of meaning and not the maker of meaning’[13]. By this statement she suggested that decisions will always be controlled by men even if women are given important roles.
“In the new millennium, it’s not just institutionalized racism that kills our self worth; it’s the songs, albums and videos, filled with lyrics and images of self hate that pass on the legacy of low self esteem.”[14] A majority of the music and videos specifically convey, and support exploited images of black women. Nonetheless black women as a race do not stand alone in this discriminative situation, Latin American and white women are also frequently subject to being negatively labelled, but mostly black women in are seen in mainstream hip-hop culture as sex objects. More or less the entire outlook of hip-hop videos that are currently broadcast on television and the internet are made up of fantasy portrayals. These videos typically show a number of women surrounding one or two men, usually wearing nothing more than skimpy bikinis, with the cameras focal subject matter being their body parts. These insulting visual aspects are accompanied by a shocking amount of explicit and degrading lyrics, commonly containing taunts and name calling to imply that women are worth nothing more than money, if that. For example in rap artist “Nelly’s” ‘Tip Drill’ song where the chorus’ message to women is: “It must be your ass cause it ain’t your face”[15]. Women are expressed as being only useful for sexual relations with rappers who describe their life as being that of a pimp. “For young people that do not hold sexist ideals, mainstream hip-hop may influence them to do so as it spreads and continuously gains popularity.”[16]
Throughout history women have been discriminated in terms of many things such as politics, jobs, education, or anything else of importance. Black women in particular were deprived of equality, and historically often found themselves being used for sexual purposes. Sadly, many of these ‘traditions’ have been passed down to the young audience of mainstream hip hop. For instance the way in which slavery dehumanized black women through the fact that they were repeatedly forced into providing sexual services to men. To an extent this is also a reflection of the way women are treated in hip hop as sex objects today. The shocking result outcome of this is that women of the 21st century equal rights and are no longer forced to do things against their wishes. So why do they still value their own self-respect at something less than that of the men who are seeking to gain power and identity through exploiting them? Women are still choosing to pay with their bodies in order to earn a living rather than using their minds, and seem to display no sense of dignity or awareness about it, so why is this? Gender representations in hip hop are as follows, women are represented as “passive-weak, ineffectual, victimised, supportive, laughable or morally token females”[17], whereas men are depicted as “assertive, aggressive- adventurous, active and victorious”[18]. Perhaps women who appear half naked in these rap videos belong to that small percentage of who became so caught up by these negative stereotypes of black females that they began to look at themselves in the same way that society saw them. Tuchman referred to women with roles or jobs in society as “incompetents or inferiors”[19].
Some argue that rap music has heard for too many years about the sex, materialism and drugs, and believe that eventually this trend will fade away with time as people begin to lose interest. This may be true; however it must be considered that this is simply not a viable explanation for a solution. Could the current state of this industry possibly get any more out of hand than it already is? Perhaps censorship would relax the situation slightly; however I do not believe that it would eradicate the problem. My independent belief is that the correct steps must be taken towards altering the mainstream ideologies, traditions and the way things are done in general, so that the imbalance between gender roles is wiped out. However, this will be a persistent struggle in itself, as rap fans and artists have been known to have a negative opinion on criticism of their work. Women who have tried to make a difference in the scene often come under criticism themselves by their male dominated.
I believe that in the past women were underrepresented in the media as in the 1970’s as “only 15% of the leading characters were women[20]”. In my opinion, a step has been taken forward towards hope for change within rap music in recent years. Thanks to artists such as Lupe Fiasco, Talib Kweli and ‘Mos Def’, all of whom are successful and powerful figures in the rap community and all of whom are black themselves; stereotypes have been challenged and subverted. Instead of rapping about luxurious, make belief lifestyles and referring to women in misogynistic ways, they choose to address real life issues that ordinary people can identify with and relate to with their own experiences. The more positive role models there are in rap music, the more chance there is that the industry will begin to clear its act up and therefore exert its power more responsibly.
My understanding of the effects that the hip hop industry has on youth culture leads me to strongly believe that education is the necessity of transforming gender relations. Women are simply regarded as there to be “looked at, objectified and sexualized by the male protagonist”*. The better people are informed of the sexism, abuse, controversy, and corruption that takes place in hip hop both verbally and physically, the more people will take the matter seriously. The sad reality is that we are left with a once positive youth culture which has deteriorated into something that is frowned on and glorified. By knowing and understanding the history of this negative epidemic, we can prevent history from happening again. Awareness should be raised in order for views and opinions to be changed. People must take affirmative action and educate others against the exploiting of women if any substantial difference is to be made. A feminist point of view is one which supports my hypotheses, and one which can also be applied to a global community as it is not restricted to just hip hop or rap.
References, quotes and footnotes:
[1] http://www.mysistahs.org/features/hiphop.htm (A link to a study entitled ‘The Exploitation of Women in Hip-Hop Culture’)
[2] Gunter, Barry, (1995), ‘Television and gender representation’, London: John Libby
[3] Phillips, Patrick, (1996) ‘Understanding Film Texts: Meaning and Experience’
[4] Tuchman, Gaye, (1978), ‘The symbolic annihilation of women in the mass media’
[5] 50 cent, (2003) lyrics extracted from song entitled ‘PIMP’
[6] http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2004/mar/08/popandrock.gender Taylor, Diane, (2004) The Guardian article ‘Attack the Rap”. (An article focussing on gender representations within rap genre)
[7] Greer Germaine, (1999), ‘The whole woman’, London: Doubleday
[8] http://www.mysistahs.org/features/hiphop.htm (A link to a study entitled ‘The Exploitation of Women in Hip-Hop Culture’)
[9] Morgan, Joan. (1999) “When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip-hop Feminist” New York: Simon and Schuster, page 78
[10] http://www.csc.vsc.edu/Com.web/femalerap.html O’Connell, Anne, A Feminist Approach to Female Rap Music (Link to a website with a short study about gender representations within rap music)
[11] Mulvey, Laura, (1975), ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’: screen 16, pp 6-18
[12] Mulvey, Laura, (1975), ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’: screen 16, pp 6-18
[13] Mulvey, Laura, (1975), ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’: screen 16, pp 6-18
[14] Oshun, Ifè, (2007), ‘Does rap music help destroy kids’ self worth?’ http://oshun55.com/ifeoshun/2007/01/19/does-rap-music-help-destroy-kids-self-worth/
[15] Rap Artist ‘Nelly’ (2003) Lyric extracted from song entitled ‘Tip Drill’
[16] http://www.mysistahs.org/features/hiphop.htm (A link to a study entitled ‘The Exploitation of Women in Hip-Hop Culture’)
[17] Gunter, Barrie (1995) Television and gender representation, London: John Libbey
[18] Gunter, Barrie (1995) Television and gender representation, London: John Libbey
[19] Tuchman, Gaye, (1978), ‘The symbolic annihilation of women in the mass media’
[20] Gauntlett, David (2002): ‘Media, Gender & Identity: An introduction’ Routledge
Bibliography-Works Cited:
Books:
-Gunter, Barrie, (1995), ‘Television and gender representation’, London: John Libby
-Phillips, Patrick, (1996) ‘Understanding Film Texts: Meaning and Experience’ BFI Publishing
-Tuchman, G. (1978), ‘The symbolic annihilation of women in the mass media’
-Gauntlett, D. (2008). ‘Media, Gender and Identity, an introduction’ New York: Routledge
-Greer Germaine, (1999), ‘The whole woman’, London: Doubleday
-Morgan, Joan. (1999) ‘When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost’: My Life as a Hip-hop Feminist” New York: Simon and Schuster
-Mulvey, Laura, (1975), ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’
Internet:
http://www.mysistahs.org/features/hiphop.htm (A link to a study entitled ‘The Exploitation of Women in Hip-Hop Culture’)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2004/mar/08/popandrock.gender Taylor, Diane, (2004) The Guardian article ‘Attack the Rap”. (An article focussing on gender representations within rap genre)
http://www.csc.vsc.edu/Com.web/femalerap.html O’Connell, Anne, A Feminist Approach to Female Rap Music (Link to a website with a short study about gender representations within rap music)
Oshun, Ifè, (2007), ‘Does rap music help destroy kids’ self worth?’ http://oshun55.com/ifeoshun/2007/01/19/does-rap-music-help-destroy-kids-self-worth/
Moving text:
-Rap Artist ‘Nelly’ (2003) Lyric extracted from song entitled ‘Tip Drill’
-Rap Artist ‘50 cent’, (2003) Lyric extracted from song entitled ‘PIMP’
