Hip Hop Demean Women

The misogynistic treatment of women in commercialized rap has become a widespread phenomenon which as a result has become commonly accepted by majority of the individuals in society. Rappers, in general, nowadays use women in their videos in a way which is both derogatory and exploiting. Black men in today’s society, especially in the entertainment industry, do not see women as their equals; rather they objectify them as being nothing more than sex objects. People in the Hip Hop industry do not believe that sexism and misogyny is as big of a deal as racism, thus they push this issue to the side by simply ignoring it and learning to accept it. This misogynistic portrayal of women is ruining the image if Hip Hop as both an industry and a form of expressive art. However, instead of taking action against this atrocity, many women simply believe that the images of women and their portrayal in rap videos does not represent nor refer to them as an individual and the type of woman they truly are. By being silent these women are allowing themselves to be victimized by the men of not only the Hip Hop industry but also general society. By not having a say in this matter of the false classification and portrayal of women, they are voluntarily allowing men to do whatever they please to do so, in any given time and with any approach they feel is necessary. They do not

“With gangster rap music being the most popular selling subgenre of rap music in the hip-hop culture, male rappers use angry, misogyny, and violence to demonstrate their masculine side (Oware 22). They interpret these characteristics into their music (lyrics and music videos) to gain a reputation of being untouchable, by flaunting this type of image, they hope to reach a level of respect among both genders. Most music artist in the rap industry use strength and the tough guy look (where they pump up their chest) to show their manhood and intimated others. However black males use the same terms as white males to describe manhood, using words like “breadwinner, protector and procreator” to fulfill their masculine

In Joan Morgan’s article “Fly-Girls, Bitches and Hoes: Notes of a Hip Hop Feminist”, she shows the way rap music has changed through it popularity. The widespread appreciation of rap had negative impacts upon the black community. Morgan talks about this through her Feminist point of view. She focuses the topic on what rap music says about the African American culture in Hip Hop. Rap music and Hip Hop were invented through the pain of African Americans. Hip Hop and the Rap industry use sexism and machoism to express the long years of oppressive pain they went through by the hands of the white people. Especially for the black brothers who continue that oppression by using provocative words that degrade the black sisters. Morgan states that blame isn’t only on the brothers

Women have decided to consume hip hop regardless of the sexism and machismo of their rap artist spouses. Historically, black women who have sex with other women haven’t been recognized in the Black community. Also, the expectations are the same in hip hop culture because men reject lesbians. An example is the murder in 2003 of Sakia Gunn after she declared her lesbian identity to a group of males. We all know that in hip hop culture men predominate and precisely masculine. Women can achieve a higher professional success than men regarding no matter their sexual orientation. In other hand, women represent different controlling images like the whore, the mammy and temptress. Homophobia in hip hop is translated into forms of oppression, discrimination and violence for gays, lesbians and transgender. “Black women rappers interpret and articulate the fears, pleasures, and promises of young black women whose voices have been relegated to the margins of public discourse.” Their voices are in constant dialogue with the public and men rappers about sexual promiscuity, emotional commitment, infidelity, the drug trade, racial politics and black cultural history. If we pay close attention to female rappers, we will notice that they address questions of sexual power, economic opportunities and the pain of racism and sexism. Women rappers has been promoted as sexually progressive, antisexist voices because of “an understanding of male rappers as uniformly sexist.” Discussions of women

Misogyny exists not only in Hip-Hop but also in American society as a whole. Objectified female bodies are everywhere: in advertising, on magazine covers, and television and movie screens. In Hip-Hop women are exploited and viewed as objects. In raps they are often called “bitches” and “hoes”, and place them in music videos half-naked furthering the

It is suggested that one of the reasons why artists use misogynistic lyrics in their music is that they have internalized the negative stereotypes about women that are prevalent in American society. African women were historically portrayed as animalistic sexual beasts and African males in a submissive role, giving in to wild instinct or bodily impulses. The internalization of such stereotypes may be a possible explanation of the hyper sexuality within certain hip hop music. Various authors have argued that misogyny is merely an outgrowth of the cultural acceptance of misogyny at large.

The article “ Hip-Hop Demeans women” written by Tricia Rose, talks about hip hop on sexism and women. She argues the changes of women’s position in the Hip Hop music which reflect it to the American black people’s culture. Rose breaks the total article into three sections, R.E.S.[.E.C.T-But Not the Kind Aretha Franklin Had in Mind, Explicit Isn’t Always Exploitative, “Free the Girl”:Hip Hop’s Betrayal of Black Women.

Hip-hop began in the 1970s in the south Bronx of New York and served a cathartic purpose for the black community. People could explore issues such as the eradication of racism and equality, but since Hip-hop was created, the cathartic use has been abused through the increased use of misogynistic lyrics and music videos. Artists like Ludacris, 50 Cent and Eminem portray women nothing more than “ho’s”, “bitches” and “freaks”. Nothing more than sex objects; and yet, their biggest fan base is adolescents, this is dreadful as neuroscientists have discovered that the teenage brain still undergoes the same radical development as seen in childhood . Teenagers are easily influenced through their formative years ; as they are consuming music videos

Throughout the article Walidah uses pop cultural references to highlight the separation of males and females, identifying females involvement in hip-hops overall existence as little to none. Primarily Walidah articulates the output of masculinity

In this essay, Joan Morgan talks about how the hip hop allows African Americans to articulate their pain. She considers that the beauty of hip hop comes from is its ability to express all kind of feelings, but many feels that hip hop lower women to just a sex object. In her journey to understand what is happening to men in the black community, she exposes herself to the music of famous male rappers. To her surprise, she discovers that the macho appearance is just a disguise to hide how hopeless they feel when it comes

An issue many have with Hip Hop music is it over-sexualisation of black women. Within hip hop music videos and the lyrics used to define women, are often portrayed in ways that calls for them to sexually satisfy men. Hunter and Soto (2009), highlighted that women in hip hop music are often characterised as sex workers. Their study coincides with Miller-young (2008), who argued Hip-Hop music has an obsession with portraying women as strippers in their song. She pointed out that Hip-Hop music is extremely misogynistic with males being shown as pimps whilst females are shown involved in sexual acts. This shows that within Hip-Hop music males are shown to be the dominating sex. This can impact on women negatively due to the fact hip-hop has become

Hip-Hop culture objectifies both men and women as both violent and aggressive and very sexual beings. For women, it shows them as simply sexual objects, whether it be half naked in music videos dancing in a sexual manner or through the lyrics which talk about the plethora of women these men have had sexual relations with. For men, it shows this hyper masculine misogynistic aggressive male body displayed in the video as well as in the lyrics with multitudes of underdressed women in the background dancing often being groped without any actual consent. This sends the message that women do not have avoice and are simply there to please the

Hip-hop culture and culture’s misogyny can be traced back to the golden era of hip-hop. In hip-hop, culture terms for men created an image of a “big-man persona” such as “baller” “pimp” and derogatory phrases such as “bitch” “ho” became common phrases to distinguish women. The rapper persona was to have a macho attitude, extravagant living, and having multiple women beside them was the way to express the Hip-hop lifestyle (Layne 1). Artists such as N.W.A., one the few pioneers of 90’s gangsta rap has associated their music with misogyny. The song titled “A Bitch Iz A Bitch” in the album Straight Outta Compton revolutionize

Many rap and ‘cool’ songs are about men using women and having absolute control over them as if they were property. Most songs refer to females in a derogatory fashion to assert subordination. Some songs tell stories of how beating up women makes men more powerful. These songs influence society’s perception of women as a whole. When they are exploited because of the sexually charged, male-dominant worldview, women are held back from realizing their full potential as strong, respected, smart human beings.

Music plays a massive role in shaping people’s perception. Rap culture has grown extensively and influenced people vastly to the point that it sets trends that emphasizes on curvier bodies or bigger behinds. It is an issue in society because while people are fighting for equality and trying to progress to a better tomorrow, there are still challenges like the entertainment playing a huge role in shaping the minds of adolescents today who will be our future tomorrow. One of the problems that rap music, especially ‘Gangsta Rap’ creates is to mislead the society by portraying women in an unpleasant way leading young men to behave or treat the women negatively. In this proposal, I will show the results of an experiment on how men who are exposed to this genre have changed their behavior accordingly, and look at how and why women are portrayed in rap music a certain way.