by Dominique. White

Created on: June 28, 2008

HIP HOP AND THE REST OF THE WORLD: Who is really responsible

There are so many things that guide how our children view the world. Some of those things are unseen while some of them stare us in the face. It is hard to pin point what is the most influential thing in a child's life because from day to day it may change. A lot of people in the world need someone to blame for when children's view of the world is somewhat distorted. Someone has to take the blame because that is the way of the world. It seems that the music of hip hop has been deemed the one and there in lies the problem.

Hip hop has become the main target for almost everything going on with America's children. When a child brings a gun to school and opens fire we blame it on hip hop. When a group of children attack another child or a group of children, we blame that on hip hop. When a child is caught stealing, breaking and entering, doing anything that is lawfully wrong or that society views as inappropriate, we blame it all on hip hop. What I honestly want to say to people is get real.
All genres of entertainment have some negativity and positivism in them. The world is full of positive and negative people so why should we expect our sources of entertainment to be any different? Movies like The Godfather trilogies do not set a good example for children. Television shows like The Real World, and the Sopranos do not set a great example for children. To the contrary, other movies such as Akeela and the Bee, and The Pursuit of Happiness set wonderful examples. There are also television shows that set good examples in the lives of our children. Even something like pieces of art carry positive and negative attributes. There are artist who paint pictures of children playing together while others paint nude bodies. Hip hop is full of those examples as well. We have artist like 50 cent, and others who are not perceived as positive role models, but on the other hand we have those like Common Sense, Kanye West, Outcast, and Will Smith who have provided great examples of positivism to young black children, and children across all color lines.
What I am trying to get across is that if we blame hip hop for everything wrong with our children. We will have to blame art as a whole. Personally, I do not believe we should be blaming artists. I do agree that some of these artists need to revise their messages but not just in the hip hop community, in every artistic community. People should not be glorifying gun, drugs,

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