Lorissa Figueroa Professor Patton ENG 1A 7 February 2018 More than what Rap Portrays When we listen to rap music we don’t really pay attention to how lyrics can affect people as often as we should. Since rap music has started it always influenced violence and sexism, but not everyone notices how it influences the black community. Joan Morgan explains this in a passage of her book When Chickenheads Come to Roost: A Hip-Hop Feminist Breaks It Down (1999). Morgan is a writer and feminist who has taught at the New School, Duke University, Vanderbilt University, and Stanford University. In the passage, From Fly-Girls to Bitches and Hos, Morgan effectively informs readers that rap music has a negative and positive effect on the black community by …show more content…
In rap music, rappers minimize women to “ass and tits” and “bitches and hos”. She goes on to say how black-on-black love is decreasing while black-on-black crimes are starting to increase. Rappers affect the meaning of true black love. The reason they call women names is because they don’t love themselves and are unable to love others. Rap also promotes drugs, murder, and gangs. This makes men feel like this is the life they want, but in reality, it’s depressing. Morgan believes that the only time men feel like they can truly express their feelings is when they are locked up in jail. Women need to learn to recognize these problems and to not settle for less. Women should also do more to avoid men calling us (women) these names. Morgan also considers that women should do more for men as well by teaching how to really love women. These kinds of situations only help women to get stronger and …show more content…
She believes that not only black men turn a blind eye on this issue but women as well. According to Morgan “Backstage, the road, and the ‘hood are populated with women who would do anything to be with a rapper sexually for an hour, if not a night” (537). Most women use sex to get what they want such as luxury items and wealth. Young women are unable to gain power by working hard because some women are trying to look for power in the wrong places. Another thing Morgan states is “Sad to say it, but many of the ways in which men exploit our images and sexuality in hip-hop is done with our permission and cooperation. We (women) allow ourselves to look and be used as sexual objects. Women should acknowledge what they are doing to themselves. This doesn’t mean it’s okay for men to degrade us, but we should be held accountable for our actions. Women are to blame too because these are the kind of men that women are falsefully in love with. They are too busy thinking about who they want them rather than who they really are. Women aren’t only disrespecting themselves, but other women as well. Women are bringing each other down because they are too busy fighting for men who don’t care who they are. Not only