The limitations and freedoms of Hip-Hop

        While I was on break I got into a disagreement with my sister about music and what music is acceptable to listen to as a black person.  She is on the side of basically only rap and hip hop is an acceptable genre for a black person to listen to regularly.  I listen to a lot of different music and therefore my sister and I have very different tastes.  This concept always confused me because it seems to limit black people on what they are allowed to enjoy.  We spoke in class that white people were the main consumers of hip-hop by a very large margin. On the surface, black people seem to only listen to rap and hip-hop and R&B, while white people are basically encouraged to cross whatever genre of music they wish.  Minorities are expected to stay in their instructed form of enjoyment, but white people have free range of just about any type of music they think is cool at the time.  This crossover of white people to hip-hop music creates a chosen ignorance by white people.  Rap was a genre of music that was created in order to speak out against systematic oppression.  It was initially created to be something for us by us because it often spoke about experiences that were specific to the African American.  
         Now we hear albums like To Pimp a Butterfly that chronicles a black person's struggle with systematic oppression playing at a frat party with almost exclusively the rich white people who are often perpetuating the problems he is discussing.  Hip Hop has an effect on black people because they can relate to the lyrics while white people have the luxury of using it as background music to their parties or not listening to it at all because it’s “too lyrical” for their taste. It is important for black people to be aware of hip-hop as a genre and what it has to offer because it often is the only place where black people can have a platform to speak on their experiences.  Although it is important, it is not necessary to limit that self-exploration to only one genre on account of other’s opinions.   Black people should not be judged for listening outside of their culture while white people are the majority consumer of genres that do not involve white culture.  This is not to say white people should not listen to hip-hop and rap, but the nature of these powerful messages being the soundtrack to their privileged lifestyles of partying and having little care for anything else is hypocritical.  Instead of just using it for a way to feel cool for knowing all the lyrics, they should take the chance to listen and understand the lyrics that they have mindlessly memorized

http://junkee.com/white-people-black-music-problem-kendrick-lamar-faces-fans-2016/75549

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Pledged Logan Griffin