Homos, Hot Beats & Hip Hop

By Keith Boykin, in pop culture
Wednesday, April 9 2003, 12:00AM

Two weeks ago I spoke at the University of Pennsylvania on the topic of homosexuality in hip hop. Before attending the event, I thought the subject of hip hop and homophobia was dead. I was wrong.

Hip Hop On Campus

I walked into a crowded room on the University of Pennsylvania campus to an overflow crowd of hues and colors aligned on the chairs and walls and floors of the room. Co-panelists Ingrid Rivera, James Peterson and I stood near the entrance as the organizers rushed in new chairs to accompany the unexpectedly large crowd.

One of our panelists, Michael Eric Dyson, had to cancel at the last minute when he realized he was doublebooked that day and had to be in Richmond to preach. We waited for a few minutes for our final panelist, Caushun, who had missed his train to Philadelphia, but we decided to start the event without him.

The Good and the Bad of Hip Hop Artists

I began by speaking about hip hop artists who have recorded homophobic music. I mentioned Brand Nubian, Canibus, Common, Cypress Hill, DMX, Eazy E, Eminem, Goodie Mob, Allen Iverson, Ice Cube, Ja Rule, Jay Z, Mase, Mobb Deep, Public Enemy, Snoop Dogg, T.O.K. and 50 Cent in my list.

Next, I moved to hip hop artists who have challenged homophobia, and here the list was much shorter. I cited Queen Pen, Queen Latifah, Common (who apparently reformed after dating Erykah Badu), Meshell Ndegeocello (who actually transcends hip hop), and Will Smith (who played a gay man in the film Six Degrees of Separation). Moderator James Peterson also reminded me of the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, who recorded a popular underground CD back in 1992 but haven't surfaced much since.

I was also intrigued by P. Diddy and LL Cool J, both of whom are popular hip hop artists who have rarely, if ever, used anti-gay lyrics in their music. And I mentioned LGBT hip hop artists including Caushun, Deep Dickollective, Dutchboy, Tori Fixx and Rainbow Flava.

Is Hip Hop Dead?

With the lists out of the way, I began to explore other questions beyond hip hop's role in homophobia. Most importantly, is hip hop still revolutionary? I would say no, although it once was. Today, hip hop has become more evolutionary than revolutionary as it has evolved deeper and deeper into mainstream culture.

Rather than words that challenge the status quo, we're more likely to get materialistic videos, overproduced music and shallow messages. Why, for example, were Jay Z and Nas fighting each other last year? Why has 50 Cent expressed his beef with Ja Rule? What difference does it make to 50 if Ja Rule is not a true gangsta? Does anybody think that Ja Rule is a gangsta anyway? Aren't there more important things to discuss today?

With the economy failing, jobs disappearing and the world at war, I would like to see more hip hop artists talking about these issues. The ones who do speak out don't get media attention. As for the ones who don't, well, how can they complain about rundown projects in the bombed-out, burned-down ghettoes when they're busy driving their Hummers and Bentleys from studio to studio to booty-shaking, Cristal-toasting industry parties?

Maybe we should expect nothing at all from hip hop artists. After all, hip hop music is a business. It's a business that often uses black talent to generate hundreds of millions of dollars for non-black record companies. Many of the hip hop artists are themselves businesspeople. No matter what they say, you can't be a practicing gangsta and a successful hip hop artist at the same time.

So who am I to challenge hip hop? It's just entertainment. Snoop Dogg once said he can't knock nobody's hustle. He was right. It is, after all, a hustle. But it's a hustle that has extremely important consequences on the larger society and on the black community.

Hip hop creates and reinforces exaggerated images of black masculinity and then uses its market power to regulate and restrict our perceptions of black authenticity. Thus, hip hop enables the commercialization and commodification of black culture for non-black business interests. Those who don't fit the newly popular pimp and thug image are discredited by their own communities, creating a vicious cultural cycle that values style over substance, money over mission, and ignorance over education.

Homosexuals in Hip Hop

During the discussion at the University of Pennsylvania panel, Caushun mentioned that he did not feel the hip hop music industry is particularly homophobic. He cited his own positive experiences with various industry leaders as an indication that the business may not be what it appears to be from the outside.

I don't have the direct experience he does, so I don't know, but I think it's important to distinguish between an artist's personal relationships and an executive's institutional obligation. Personally, the music executives may be very friendly, but I think we should demand more than a polite smile and a pat on the back to get homo-positive music released.

Given the trends in our culture, it's not surprising that hip hop is filled with LGBT artists, producers, musicians, stylists and song writers. But few of these people are out publicly, and many sit by silently while their artists promote intolerance of gays and lesbians.

Caushun said that he is not offended by homophobic music lyrics and suggested that we give too much power to words sometimes. Perhaps he's right, at least for well-adjusted adults who are secure in their identity. But I'm not quite as willing to let artists off the hook for the homophobic words that negatively influence young people. The 13-year-old boy or the 15-year-old girl who internalizes the animus in the word "fag" or "dyke" may not react so positively as adults do.

The same pheonomenom takes place in the rest of society too. That's why we can't resolve the problem of homophobia in hip hop until we address the larger problem of homophobia in society.

A World Without Hip Hop

Since I first wrote about this topic years ago, I have struggled to understand how and why gays and lesbians embrace homophobic hip hop artists. Since that time, I've come to realize the difficulty in separating one's self from the dominant cultural paradigm.

Hip hop ain't what it used to be. Most of society has now embraced hip hop. Everything from soda pop to pop music is being promoted by and influenced by hip hop. Young people from the suburbs to Serbia now shake their booties to hip hop beats. If music is truly the universal language, then hip hop is the hot new slang.

I realized the universal appeal of hip hop recently on an unplanned shopping trip in New York. A week before I was scheduled to speak at the University of Pennsylvania, I found myself looking for a pair of shorts to wear to the gym when I walked into Urban Outfitters on Sixth Avenue in Chelsea on a Sunday afternoon and they were playing "Rapper's Delight." I found out they don't sell gym shorts there, so I walked a few blocks north to Old Navy, where the speakers were blaring the sounds of "Five Minutes of Funk."

The white people strolling through the store seemed as comfortable as I did singing the lyrics of the song. For better or for worse, hip hop has come a long way. Where it goes from here is up to us.

Newspaper article on University of Pennsylvania panel

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