Russel Simmons

Yeah, I watched Oprah...This ain't about poetry, hip hop...or censorship!

I am a poet, and I took exception to Russell Simmons donning the breastplate of artistry, while standing on his righteous indignation over censoring said artistry to defend and legitimize the output of various rap performers. (I refuse to give many of them the dignity of being called poets much less artists.) His naming, those who write and perform rap music as poets, without making distinctions regarding the type of rap music they perform was circumspect, best case scenario, or worse case scenario, duplicitous.

As far as I'm concerned, all rap is not created equal, and Hip Hop is not the commodity mass produced and blasted on radio and television stations. Hip Hop depicts a culture of consciousness one that observes, analyzes and reflects the world in which it exists. It seeks to educate and uplift, to offer criticism and critique, to mobilize its listeners to pursue positive change, both inwardly and outwardly. Sometimes, Hip Hop is just plain fun. Hip Hop lives mostly off the screen of mainstream entertainment, creating the occasional blip--Common....Mos Def...Eryka Badu....Jill Scott.

In my opinion, much of the rap music produced, sold and shoved via the spoon of mass marketing down the throats of those who once loved it, is an over exuberant exercise in mediocrity. Rap has become a festival of depravity in which the most base and debasing elements of human existence are glamorized and presented as life pursuits. I won't focus on the misogyny of rap, because it is guilty of many other abuses as well. From its perspective, the world is full of black people who are moving targets which receive every type of abuse, mental, physical and sexual, especially from their own.