HIP HOP NEEDS A BLACK PANTHER MOMENT

On the way to a Friday night viewing of the Black Panther I allowed my 12-year old son to select the radio station. I'm most positive that some variation of this has happened thousands of times over the course of the last few weeks, and I do understand how tragically 20^th century this is, with the dearth of internet streaming options readily available.

However, I prefer to listen to his music in this way. The current brand of hip hop is much more palliative for me in its watered down, “radio friendly” format.

Here it is important for me to note that, at least for my sake, it is not simply a question of quality. Of what is or is not considered to be culturally significant. I listened to shitty music as a youngster also. I believe we all probably have. It's nearly a right of passage and years on, there remains the occasional breakthrough piece of garbage that has still managed to occupy space on our playlists.

Much of this nostalgic recollection won't ever be judged on its lyrical content. Or its validity as a cultural touchpoint. Bullshit and party sells. I get it. Where I find issue, however, is with the purveyors of the culture who have consistently maintained the same premise in defense of the music, or most specifically, the subject matter.

Nothing, in this, has changed since hip hop's initial rise in prominence and the most common refrains have remained the same, the music is just 'talking about what's really goin on in the 'hood', or 'hip hop is just the ghetto version of CNN'.

But if that's the case, this is tragedy, not triumph, that is being celebrated today in music. That the hottest hip hop artists are still extolling the virtues of upward mobility through short term, and ultimately terminal means, is suggestive of a warped worldview that in and of itself has become endemic. It's indicative of an attempt at propagandizing a broken morality as the most likely form of flaunted success.

If our art, though, is reflective of our culture, there should be a more honest examination of said reflection. In doing so, it would be easy enough to see the truth, there has been no evolution, no ascension, if the most commonly celebrated means of 'getting paid' amongst America's most despondent leaves behind nothing but a trail of broken families and communities.

If given over to such scrutiny, it would be easy to recognize that thirty or more years worth of such culturally crippling messaging is in fact proof of stagnation, not success.

For those few who manage to enjoy and rap about the comforts to be found in illicit gain, a singular perspective can be beneficial to the bottom line. To the majority, however, this points to no less than a systemic failure.

The artistic atmosphere of the culture should serve as an indicator of the overall health of the community at large, or serve at least as a beacon of hope towards which the whole shifts in search of, even if slowly.

The uptick in the rate of interest and enrollment in HBCU's and in college in general for African-American's during the 'A Different World' era, I believe, is a good indication of this concept in action.

Juxtapose this with the last thirty years worth of singularly recurrent subject matter in a hip hop lexicon that revolves around 'money, hoes, cars and clothes.'

How refreshing then to see the prideful moment in an alternate cultural presentation such as the recently released Black Panther movie. It is enough to hope that perhaps the community at large has finally reached the point of horrific ghetto/slave narrative saturation.

There has always remained a hunger for a more nuanced, much more diverse presentation of the culture. Of the people. And yet, it has always been easy enough for the policy makers to claim that they are indeed simply providing a reflection of the people's desires.

That Lil Yachty is just what the people asked for. Just what we deserve.

But how true is this when this policy is crafted within the confines of an ivory tower that serves well as a gilded silo, an echo chamber resonating with predisposed ideologies?

Perhaps its not so much that this is what the people want, then, but what the Merchant Kings feel that they deserve.

A quick google search of album sales and or views amongst the various artists proves the point. The more prominently conscious rappers, the Kendrick Lamar's and J. Cole's, numbers broadly eclipse those of the self proclaimed drug dealing pimps.

It must be considered then, if these 'conscious' artists are eclipsing their counterparts, why is so much emphasis given over to the more negative aspects within the culture? This would seem to be the complete antithesis of a corporate mandate.

Unless, of course, that mandate is driven by such inherent bias that the thought of a positive representation being profitable is impossible to fathom, even when presented with irrefutable evidence to the contrary.

Either way, as a result of this persistent bias, we got Lil Yachty. Over and over again.

And then Black Panther happened. The Merry Minds at Marvel Studios are to be given much credit for this. They took a chance that the character would be capable of standing for itself. That a huge investment in such an idea was worth it.

For those 'nerdy negroes' like myself, the 'hood kids who had to shoplift their comic books in search of escape back in the day, this was a 'well, duh' moment. For us there has always existed powerful heroes and cross genre characterizations that we could envision in a much larger than life format.

The Wonder Woman movie is another that comes to mind in the more recently enlightened financial awakenings happening in corporate boardrooms across America right now. It was only a surprise to the stuffy old shirts in those rooms that such an intricately crafted character, with decades of interesting storylines and a built-in fan base that extends across several generations, would be successful.

It was only a surprise then for those old white men whose ideas on the matter lead them to throw good money prodigiously at bad concepts.

But the culture of the Marvel Comics has always been perceived as being much more inclusive. And its possible that this perception exists solely amongst us nerdy negroes because of the likes of the Black Panther and Luke Cage.

Even then, though, many of their stories, when originally presented, sucked. We were willing to overlook this, however, maybe just because we appreciated that someone, somewhere, was even trying.

Now that the people, the consumers, the non-racially specific, have risen up en masse and offered overwhelming support for Wonder Woman and The Black Panther during a period in time that has left the bean counters in Hollywood worried that their movie business model is dying, perhaps we can begin to see higher level and more diverse concepts being developed and presented.

Perhaps the global success of these movies, non-traditionally headlined by and presented with diverse interests in mind, will serve as an eye opener for the disbelievers, the nay-saying investors who avidly guard their wallets against opinionated women and the yellow, brown and black hordes.

Now, more than ever, it's time that we demand it.