Article: “Has Hip-Hop Had an Adverse Effect on Our Young?” by ScholarMan
The other day while I was updating my account on Twitter, I noticed a “re-tweet” from an associate of mine. For those new to Twitter lingo, a re-tweet is when you re-post something someone already posted, including the original author to give them credit for their post. For the sake of non-name dropping I will leave their account names out. 

The re-tweet was this: 

“i HATE to say it but truly think hip hop had an adverse effect on a lotta brotha’s character development [folks gon b mad i said it]

2:07 PM Sep 15^th” 

After reading this I was positive that a debate would spawn as yes, many folks would have an opinion on this – I being one of them. My associate noted that he “didn’t agree” with the user’s statement when he posted the re-tweet. After reading it myself, I replied to both my associate and the other user with this: 

“not the culture, some of the the people maybe” 

My associate responded that he agreed with my sentiments. The user who wrote the tweet saw my response and here is where the discussion went at this point: 

User @ScholarMan “the people are a part of the culture.” 

ScholarMan @User  “Indeed, so if anything, blame the people, not the culture.” 

User @ScholarMan “the culture is the people!” 

ScholarMan @User “a couple bad apples doesn’t mean the tree is bad.. but I hear you” 

Nothing more was said. Can you really say hip-hop is the cause of the lack of growth of the young men who listen to it? I don’t agree. My argument was that yes people are the culture, in the culture but you can only blame the leaders within the movement for the negative effects the movement might have had on those within it. My analogy was “a couple bad apples doesn’t mean the tree is bad.” 

Hip-hop is huge with many layers and areas and a statement like “hip hop had an adverse effect on a lotta brotha’s character development” is too broad. If the user had said “gangster rap has had an adverse effect on a lot of brothers character development” then I would agree. I know plenty of people who have been listening to hip-hop since their days of wearing diapers (including myself) and the certain type of hip-hop they listen to has helped them much or not at all with their character development. 

This is no different than a company who has had bad management causing the quality of work from its employees to go down. The company is great, been around for years, but because of bad management the employees are disgruntle, tired, etc. What happens then? Complaints are made about the management and then eventually (hopefully) those ineffectively managing the company are removed and new personnel is brought in. So who is truly to blame, the company or the management? 

In hip-hop there are many sub-genres and styles of music, and perceptions of them. Just because a dude who listens to gangster rap 90% of the time can’t separate the music from his reality doesn’t mean hip-hop as a whole is to blame. Looking at it deeper, I blame lack of parenting and sound guidance as the REAL issue. 

Some folks were stabbed or shot after both a Jay Z and Fabolous concert recently – did hip-hop do this? No, the people did. You can’t blame hip-hop.

This article was contributed by ScholarMan

Chali 2na was Hip Hop Official’s artist of the week this week. If you havent yet, pick up “Fish Outta Water.”

Distrakt is one of my favorite underground emcees. Recently, he’s been doing a lot of work with Sedgwick and Cedar. This video walks you through his newest creation, a FREE downloadable interactive study of the history of hip-hop. Dope and educational.

You don’t normally think of rap stars as having much to do with Washington’s health care debate. After all, hip-hop is mainly about young people and young people almost never think they’re going to get sick. But, even rappers get older, if they’re lucky. Bodies begin to give out, doctor bills begin to pile up and suddenly that health care debate hits home.

“Normally I find it kind of hard being a part of things like this,” said hip-hop artist Malik Taylor, better known as “Phife” or “Phife Dawg” from the Billboard award-winning rap group A Tribe Called Quest.

True that. “This” was a health care round table co-sponsored by the New York-based Hip-Hop Theater Festival, which is something that is in town this week besides Congress.

The panel was held at the Washington, DC, headquarters of the Service Employees International Union, one of many “lobbyists” (If you don’t like what they’re lobbying for) and “stakeholders” (If you do) who are vigorously working the health care debate in Congress this summer.

In the 21 years since Tribe’s birth, Taylor has learned a few things about holes in America’s safety net –the hard way.

First there was his late friend James Dewitt Yancey, better known as J Dilla, an influential rap artist and producer who before his death from lupus in 2006, worked with Chicago’s Common and other well known stars.

During four years of struggle against the often-debilitating autoimmune disease, Dilla’s inadequate health insurance coverage ran out, leaving his family with mounting bills of thousands of dollars every month that friends and fans have tried to help pay off with fundraisers.

Phife’s doing his part, plus helping to raise public awareness of Lupus and the nation’s broken health care system — especially after dealing with health issues of his own.

Tracy Jarrett, an intern for this blog who interviewed Phife, picks up the story here:

In May 1990, Phife was diagnosed with diabetes. A self proclaimed sugar addict, Phife approached his health and dietary needs in the ways of a classic self-indulgent hip-hop star, which is to say that he did not take much care at all.

In 1999, after Tribe broke up, he noticed a pimple-like bump on his neck. Soon he was shocked to learn from a doctor that: “Your kidneys have died. You may have to start dialysis.”

He gained weight and his heart began to fail. In 2006, he recalls, with his heart working at only 25 percent, he would need a kidney transplant. Immediately. After two other donors resulted in complications, he found an ironic match closer than he had imagined: his wife.

Since January, four months after his transplant, he’s been working and traveling again. And fortunately he was covered by his wife’s health insurance, saving them from the six-figure debt that burdened Phife’s family.

“(W) hat I’ve been through the past four or five years, and prior to that, the J Dilla situation,” said Phife at the SEIU roundtable, “—that’s basically what made me come to my senses and say I have to do something to help.”

His motto? “Each one, teach one.”

Source:
Chicago Tribune

With President Obama pushing to create millions of new “green-collar” jobs, being eco-conscious might not just be a good idea, it may become a lucrative one as well. But buying organic, starting your own garden and living the sustainable life can be expensive, and for many people, it might feel as though the green movement is a nice but unavailable crusade that has all but passed them by.

“While certain parts of the Bay Area are very eco-conscious, for people in some parts of the city, like Bayview-Hunters Point, they just don’t have access to some of the resources, the technology or information that would allow them to live in an ecologically conscious, self-sustaining way,” says Ambessa Cantave, who with wife Zakiya Harris founded Grind for the Green in 2007, an organization dedicated to bringing ideas on how young people can shape a green future for themselves and practical resources for sustainable living to underserved communities.

This Saturday, Grind for the Green kicks off the SF Youth Commission’s 2009 Youth Fest with a special Eco-Music Conference for young people 14-24 years old, at which Cantave and Harris hope to use the socially conscious messages of hip-hop as a way of introducing young people to the idea of living green. For the daylong event, San Francisco State’s downtown campus, located in the Westfield mall, will become what Cantave calls a mini green sphere of information, exhibits and walk-through activities. There will be all-organic food – served in compostable packaging – that you can munch on while taking in live hip-hop performances. Producer and San Francisco State University faculty Gian Fiero will share his insights about breaking into the music industry, but true hip-hop devotees will want to hear the keynote speech from M-1 – of the intense and socially conscious underground hip-hop group Dead Prez – all on sound systems and audio gear powered in real time by volunteers pedaling away on generators on loan from Rock the Bike.

“We want to bring youth into the epicenter of the sustainability movement,” says Cantave. “Hopefully this event will empower them by giving them the tools, giving them the information they need but don’t have widespread access to. We want them to understand why sustainability is important to their lives.”

After the conference, head on down to the Civic Center Plaza, where Youth Fest 2009 continues from noon to 6 p.m. with performances featuring homegrown hip-hop talents from Oakland’s Latino quartet Brwn Bflo to smooth and soulful San Francisco artist Melina Jones. And if you can’t make the conference, Grind for the Green will be back later this summer with a beat battle on Aug. 15 at Zeum and a free outdoor, solar-powered concert at the Yerba Buena Gardens Festival on Aug. 30 at noon.

Source:
The San Francisco Chronicle

This is a artist feature for the 2009 Rock The Bells tour. This feature is on K’naan, who’s “Troubadour” remains one of the top albums of the year.

This is a CNN report on the Hip-Hop Caucus’ “Green the Block Initiative,” a campaign intended to address urban poverty and climate change at the same time.

The power of music and the power of politics met Tuesday, with a hip-hop mogul and one of the most prominent leaders in Congress joining their considerable forces to spotlight issues facing youth in America.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi attended a youth conference co-sponsored by entrepreneur and entertainer Russell Simmons in Washington. The one-day event, called Keeping the Promise to Our Children, brought legislators together with entertainment A-listers, including Oscar-nominee Terrence Howard, who used their celebrity to advocate a variety of causes: foster care, health care and education among them.

Simmons’ Hip Hop Summit Action Network and the nonprofit, California-based Children Uniting Nations hosted the event. This is the fourth conference organized by Daphna Ziman, an adoptive mother of a child formerly in foster care and founder of Children Uniting Nations, which matches children in foster care with mentors.

Actress Gabrielle Union and actor/musician Howard were among the celebrities at the conference who pushed for policy changes directed at improving educational outreach to foster children. Only 54 percent of children in foster care graduate high school, according to the University of Chicago’s Chapin Hall Center for Children.

“Intervening in the lives of these young people, giving them a sense of dignity and worth, providing them with more opportunities, therefore, is one of the most important things you can do, not just for them, which is the most important thing, but for the strength of our country,” said Pelosi at a news conference before the event.

Panel discussions at the conference also addressed nutrition, mental health, HIV/AIDS and drug abuse. Children Uniting Nations plans to lobby Congress on these issues, said the organization’s spokeswoman, Juliette Harris.

Last year, the organization pushed for a $5,000 college loan subsidy for students who mentor at-risk youths, and the subsidy was passed in the House as part of the College Opportunity and Affordability Act. This year, the organization has lobbied for the Foster Care Mentoring Act of 2009, which was introduced by Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-Louisiana; and Rep. Joseph Crowley, D-New York, also attendees at Tuesday’s conference. The act proposes an allocation of $15 million for foster-care mentoring programs.

Investing in youths now can help them stay out of trouble and be more successful adults, said Simmons.

“We have such a great opportunity to make changes at this time and save our communities money and anguish,” said Simmons. “The economics of saving kids save money.”

Source:
CNN

The Maqusi Towers in Gaza City look a bit like US housing projects. The neighborhood consists of several tall apartment buildings grouped together in the northern part of town. It is also ground zero for Gaza’s growing Hip-Hop community. On a recent evening in one small but well-decorated apartment, a dozen rappers and their friends and families relaxed, danced, smoked flavored tobacco, and rapped the lyrics to some of their songs.

The occasion was a post-show celebration of the taping of Hip Hop Kom, an American Idol-type talent competition for Palestinian rappers. Fifteen acts from across Palestine performed on Thursday night, and the show was broadcast simultaneously in Gaza City and the West Bank city of Ramallah. Through the use of video conferencing and projection, each city could see and hear the performances happening in the other. Five groups from Gaza participated, and Gazawians came in first, third, and fourth place.

The Gaza City show was held in a small theatre in the Palestine Red Crescent building. Although only publicized by word of mouth, nearly 200 young people filled the theatre, loudly cheering for the rappers and breakdance crew who took the stage.

One of the organizers of the contest, a charismatic literature major named Ayman Meghames, is a minor celebrity here. Part of Gaza’s first Hip-Hop group — named PR: Palestinian Rapperz — Ayman dedicates his time to supporting and publicizing Gaza’s young music scene.

Armed with a ready smile, Ayman was seemingly everywhere at once that night. He was on stage introducing the acts, helping with technical difficulties, greeting friends, and coordinating with the West Bank organizers.

For Ayman, making music is a form of resistance to war and occupation, and also a tool to communicate the reality of life in Palestine. “Most of our lyrics are about the occupation,” he tells me. “Lately we’ve also started singing about the conflict between Hamas and Fatah. Any problem, it needs to be written about.” Rapper Chuck D, from the group Public Enemy, once called rap music the CNN for Black America. For Ayman and his friends, music is their weapon to break media silence. “Most of the world believes we are the terrorists,” he says. “And the media is closed to us, so we get our message out through Hip-Hop.”

One of the first acts to take the stage was a duo called Black Unit Band. Mohammed Wafy, one of the two singers, displays the innocent charm of a teen pop star as he jumps from the stage and into the audience. Tall and skinny with a shock of black hair, Mohammed is 18 and looks younger. Khaled Harara, the other singer (and Mohammed’s next door neighbor) is a few years older and several pounds heavier, but no less energetic on stage.

As the evening progressed, the energy in the room continued to rise. The next act featured six members from two combined groups (DA MCs, and RG, for Revolutionary Guys) now collectively called DARG Team. The crowd was up on their feet, many of them singing along as the performers displayed a range of lyrical stylings.

In Mohammed Wafy’s apartment, the perfomers waited anxiously for the results of the contest. The call came in on Ayman’s cel phone. Putting it on speaker, everyone listened as the results were announced: DARG team had come in first place, and Black Unit had placed third. There were no hurt feelings apparent for those that didn’t win — for these young performers, every victory is a shared victory. DARG members will now go on to Denmark to produce an album (if they can get out of Gaza).

Fadi Bakhet, a studious and slightly preppy looking Afro-Palestinian in wire-rimmed glasses, is DARG’s manager, and also the brother of one of the members. As the night continued, the gathering moved to his apartment. They celebrated the successful show, which also fell on the last day of exams for many students, and the laughing and conversation continued late into the night. The next day was hot and sunny, and thousands of Gazawians gathered on the beach to swim and relax by the Mediterranean.

These stories may seem incongruent with much of the international reporting about Gaza and the Hamas government. But it is exactly for this reason that they should be told.

If you follow the reporting on Palestine in the US media, you may imagine a fundamentalist state. Hamas-stan, as at least one Israeli commentator has called it. You may imagine a nation of terrorists, where women are oppressed and men launch rockets. But perhaps when we learn that Palestinian families swim on Friday afternoons, that they study literature in the day and rap about imprisoned friends at night, we can rethink the US’ unquestioning support for Israeli aggression against this almost entirely defenseless population.

Yesterday, I visited a journalism class at the Islamic University, taught by Rami Almeghari. The students had many questions, but one young woman’s words in particular stayed with me. “What can we do to reach people in America and tell them how things really are here,” she asked. “How can we get them to listen, and to see?”

Source:
Article written by Jordan Flaherty for Dissident Voice

This article was titled “Mos Def is most thoughtful as he focuses on myriad projects” by USA Today – Mos Def can’t suppress sheer delight over the exotic strains, heady beats and slurry flow of politically charged poetry on his new album, in stores Tuesday. That joy does not explain its title, “The Ecstatic.” Such logic would be too tidy for hip-hop’s cerebral agitator. “The Ecstatic” borrows its name from Victor LaValle’s 2002 darkly comic novel about an obese college dropout sinking into mental illness as his colorful Queens, N.Y., family copes.

“The term was used in the 17th and 18th centuries to describe people who were either mad or divinely inspired and consequently dismissed as kooks,” Mos Def says. “Something about that just resonated with me.

“It’s also a type of devotional energy, an impossible dream that becomes reality but is discredited before it’s realized. The airplane, a nutty idea. The telephone, the Internet. People who envisioned those were considered radical or extreme.”

“I love my decks,” he says. “It’s a great way to discover a neighborhood and keep fit. And it’s really Zen.”

A jumble of contradictions, he reads The Economist and relishes crass VH1 dating show For the Love of Ray J. Introduced to Islam by his father, he’s a Muslim who sprinkles his speech with “mashallah” (“what Allah wills”) but clings to Christian tenets.

“I’ve never felt like Islam was a discontinuation of Christianity,” says the twice-married father of seven. “I very much believe in Jesus. It was a natural progression. I come from a family of very devout, praying people. That idea of peace and love toward humanity shouldn’t be nationalistic or denominational. It should be a chief concern for all mankind.”

A subdued presence
There’s no posse when the rapper arrives poolside at the tony Sunset Marquis hotel on a recent sunny afternoon. His 5-year-old son, Fidel, changes out of a Spider-Man costume for a dip, insisting that Dad join him. Mos Def strips to his swim trunks and dives in, coaxing the boy to jump. A firm no. He gently lowers him in, but it’s too chilly, so Fidel is quickly swaddled into a towel and Mos Def swims a few laps.

Settling in for a chat, Mos Def, a vegetarian, offers to order hummus or guacamole for Fidel, who prefers to curl up in his father’s lap.

Over the next hour, Mos Def quotes John Lennon, Socrates, a Ghanaian proverb and his refrigerator magnet (“Peace is not the absence of trouble”). He talks about how his writing and rhyming skills have sharpened since the single Universal Magnetic put him on the rap map 12 years ago.

“The aim is high,” Mos Def says of his fourth studio effort and first since 2006’s True Magic, which was released without promotion in a clear case sans cover art. Conversely, three singles have preceded the arrival of The Ecstatic, which draws on the talent of Madlib, Slick Rick, Chad Hugo, Scarface, Talib Kweli and K’Naan. “I don’t want to waste anyone’s time or money. I want to give people some truth and positive heart lift. The quality, clarity and ambition are there. There are no discotheque anthems. Um, no disrespect to discotheque.”

The unusually self-effacing and modest Brooklyn-based rapper, born Dante Terrell Smith, rose through hip-hop’s underground in the late ’90s, breaking ranks with the commercially powerful gangsta idiom to revive the socially conscious approach popularized earlier by Arrested Development, De La Soul and KRS-One.

His 1998 collaboration with Kweli, the hip-hoppers’ self-titled Black Star, and 1999 solo debut Black on Both Sides, proved hugely influential.

His rap output grew erratic as his focus shifted to Hollywood, where he’s built an impressive résumé, earning praise alongside A-listers in such mainstream fare as The Italian Job, The Woodsman and Monster’s Ball. He co-starred with Bruce Willis in 16 Blocks and with Jack Black in Be Kind Rewind and earned Emmy and Golden Globe nods for HBO’s Something the Lord Made. He portrayed Chuck Berry in Cadillac Records.

Mos Def, who embraces the Hollywood establishment but rejects the music industry machinery, “is kind of an enigma, and he’s been on an unconventional path,” says Elliott Wilson, founder of hip-hop news site RapRadar.com and author of the upcoming Jay-Z biography, Soul of a Hustler. “I haven’t loved everything he put out, and there’s sometimes a lack of dedication to music when he uses other avenues to express himself. He’s talented but hasn’t completely lived up to his promise in hip-hop.

“He’s a very intelligent dude, smarter than the average rapper,” Wilson says. “He still has a core following that’s excited to see where he’s going musically. Kanye West was a product of Black Star, and that school of socially aware, uncompromising rap also influenced T.I. and Lil Wayne.”

Not afraid to speak his mind
Don’t underestimate Mos Def’s “everyday Joe” appeal, says Billboard senior editor Gail Mitchell.

“There’s an earnestness and authenticity that translate to his rapping and movie roles,” she says. “He’s an underground favorite who’s never tried to be anyone but who he is. And with everything that’s going on in the world, there’s a climate for his music now. Folks want realness, not doomsday stuff, but messages that make you think. Even Eminem is getting introspective.”

A frequent firecracker on HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher, Mos Def doesn’t duck soapboxes. He carps with wit and invective about pet issues from post-Katrina New Orleans (“It’s unconscionable for that reality to persist”) to conspiracy theories labeling 9/11 an inside job (“I’m a New Yorker and it just doesn’t feel right”).

Distrustful of media, he has faith in music’s power to illuminate and educate, but not with the slap of a ruler.

“At the very least, music has to make people feel good, especially during tough times,” he says. “Good art provides people with a vocabulary about things they can’t articulate. So yeah, put something useful in there. It can be vulgar, provocative, dark; a lot of things in life are.”

The Ecstatic flirts with modern studio tools and machined beats, which Mos Def embraces, but he has yet to get an iPod, confessing he’s both geek and phobic when it comes to technology.

“It’s a mix of curiosity, fascination, respect and bewilderment,” he says. “Twitter freaks me out. You have followers? It feels so obsessive and proprietary. It has great applications, and it’s effective, I get it. But ‘I did something, I did something else, I’m at it again.’ Why?

“I’m still getting over YouTube, people. These breakthroughs are coming at such velocity that before you get your sea legs, there’s another wave hitting you.”

With The Ecstatic complete, Mos Def is pondering movie offers. Recent screwball caper Next Day Air didn’t triumph, but he has higher hopes for Toussaint, a biopic about Haitian revolutionary Toussaint L’Ouverture, to be directed by Danny Glover and co-starring Wesley Snipes and Don Cheadle.

“It’s hard to take Hollywood too seriously,” Mos Def says. “If you can turn a dollar and sleep at night, then cool. Whether a movie sinks or swims, you want to have a decent experience, so you go for something that at least is trying to be good.”

He refuses to let regrets or resentments cloud his sanguine demeanor. Pressed to identify buzz kills, he says, “Oppression. Leaders misusing power to enslave and murder.”

Anything else?

He laughs. “I like peace and love. When people get too aggro, I’m like, really? Do you have to be hollering? I’m not shy about heated debate or passionate discourse, but when people get crazy or rude, that’s a buzz kill. There’s got to be a better code of conduct, some basic etiquette.”

Fidel suddenly pipes up. “Can we go to the other pool?”

Mos Def pulls him closer. “Not yet. I’m still working.”

Fidel frowns. “Dada, can we go to the beach tomorrow?”

Mos Def flashes a broad smile and says, “My life is awesome.”

Source:
USA Today