THE DIVINE FEMININE IN HIP HOP… IS MISSING

The Divine Feminine is not well represented by Nicki Minaj or Cardi B.

I am not saying they are without talent. In fact, Cardi lamented that some of her more serious songs don’t get any play and that her “pussy” songs get all the attention.

The popular feminine voice in hip hop is not really a diverse voice. Instead of bragging about fucking your girl, it’s bragging about fucking your man. Everyone gotta be on the lookout as we notch more ruined relationships on our gender neutral belts. Next, both sexes espouse non-stop money worship; it is becoming more and more overt. Then, we need to shame or put men down if they don’t have enough money or a big enough dick in the same way the male rappers put women down if they don’t give good enough head or aren’t attractive enough or listen to what they say. Popularized women rappers glorify violence to some extent, but not quite as much as on the men’s side. They also glorify drug use and robbing so long as you get to the top. You go girl, you do you! They had it coming for em… ok.

So at the macro level, this is all very important because music is mind control. Music has a huge influence on culture, like it or not. Songs streamed millions of times on the radio are bound to impact the culture, opinions, behaviors and lifestyles. Toxic songs create toxic mindsets. No, not automatically but to the minds of the youth and easily malleable, it does have some form of influence.

Music is big business. Songs and singles are not put out accidentally. There are cap structures, contracts, publishing, deals with other companies and brands for product placement and there are topographical limits placed on artists. In other words, censorship. Yeah, it’s there. Lupe Fiasco has documented his struggles with Atlantic Records at length if you want some proof of this. The issue is not a lack of amazing music from talented artists of both sexes. The issue is what gets pushed by the machine – by the corporations who own the masters and the promo budgets to get the radio play and placement on top playlists/blogs. That is very much still a thing although MAYBE not as bad as before.

Let’s look at some double standards in hip hop, shall we. What would the response be if thousands of songs talked about killing “k*kes” or “crackas” instead of “n*ggas”? Just think about it. Violence against other “black” men is referenced as a staple in hip hop. Yes, some of this has to do with the reality of life in certain areas. And perhaps like action movies, violence sells. But, this has become so routine, we almost don’t even notice it anymore. The n word is widely accepted for “black” people to say and I am no way arguing that that should be taken away (infantile and stupid argument from well-meaning but ultimately misled and misread white people in control positions). However, my point is that the songs are about killing each other. Non-stop. Not sure if a study has been done on this but if we were to count the references of violence in hip hop and who are the targeted population of violence against, it is a MASSIVELY high proportion of against “n*ggas”.

These albums are put out by mainly white/Jewish owned labels. But if you mention that you are “getting Jewish money” in a complimentary way in a mainstream song that was released by a Jewish owned label (Sony Music by way of Epic Records), you and anyone who quotes it owe a public apology. Here were the lyrics:
“I don’t drink no liquor, but I’m smokin’ on mimosa (Yeah)
We been gettin’ that Jewish money, everything is Kosher (On God)”

Now, there was an entire song produced called “Arab Money” by Busta Rhymes (complete with the vocoder/autotuned chorus):
“La ilaha illa Allah, ha la ili, hay yo
Hili b’Allah, hey, hili bay yo
We getting Arab money
We getting Arab money
Hala sheiki, ha lini falla
Mili ha lan shi inni mala
We getting Arab money
We getting Arab money”

Genius notes: “The lyrics are Arabic, but he took some liberty with the pronunciation. He is singing part of the shahada, the Islamic creed… These lyrics cause a lot of controversy since it is forbidden to sing verses from the quaran.”

Not sure how controversial though, I remember everyone singing it and not many apologies coming out immediately like sheepish boys.

You see the difference? One group is not only respected, the respect is demanded or there is consequences. The other group is encouraged and funded to talk non-stop shit about their own kind and promote violence, drug use, drug selling, abuse of women/men, fornication etc. Now, I am not saying these artists are not responsible for their own lyrics and for “selling their soul” as nearly all of them say they do (any of high success). However, I am questioning, why is this at the forefront of American entertainment for decades?

We all have a part in what music becomes popular by what we consume. Party music will always have its place. I like it too. But I think we all can agree there can be more balance in what is consistently promoted. Songs can be fun, sexy and even aggressive without becoming tools used to destroy society or a community/group of communities.

To tie this back to the Divine Feminine (which I have not defined here, you can Google it yourself and yes is not exclusively tied to women either – the spirit is in all of us), women are not being well represented in hip hop. There is better talent out there with better messages, better wordplay, better storytelling, better references, better content, etc. There certainly is. Let’s make them more famous and let’s do that for the men as well.

What we are getting from Cardi B and Nicki Minaj, in all reality, is more masculinity. And it is the toxic kind. The message is the same. And we are tricking young women to believe this is empowerment.

“We’ll have a race of babies that’ll hate the ladies, that make the babies”

Touché Tupac. Touché.