Hip Hop Life

It's not a surprise that I chose this reading to talk about because I have expressed in my portfolio that I am a hip hop dancer. However, I'm going to make a different argument on the essay I read about Hip Hop. I respect the craft usually, however, not always. Today hip hop isn't what it used to be. I sometimes beleive that it holds African-American culture back a lot because of the limitted ways hip hop is being expressed in this generation. Glamour, thug life, drugs, "hoes"-pardonnez mon francais, and clubbing is what is hitting the air waves a lot. You just can't deny it. There are a lot of conscious rappers out there, yes, but if you are talking about what makes up the general perception of hip hop right now and you leave out the bull that is forced-fed to you, then you are in denial. I give credit to hip hop for allowing a pathway of black culture to rise and be noticed, to influence American culture, and even offer a "way out the hood". However, I shun it personally for not doing enough to show the positive sides of what black culture looks like inside the homes and the ghettoes some of us grew up in. Not all of us "sling crack", smoke weed, "bag bitches", and take that route because we lack a better education system. Some of us still do our best to overcome our misfortunes and find different paths of getting to where we want to be. I disagree with what DeSean Walker was talking about in that sense.