Rapper faces down a gun lobby that argues for maximum firepower and minimum responsibility
Hip-Hop Speaks to the Guns
By TA-NEHISI COATES, NYT
The work of the rapper Kendrick Lamar should enjoy heavy rotation in the White House these days. In this time of Tucson, Aurora, Colo., and Newtown, Conn., Lamar’s major-label debut album, “good kid, m.A.A.d city,” gives us a broad reckoning with the meaning of everyday gun violence unfolding far from the tragic spectacle. “Good Kid” has earned its share of praise from critics and hip-hop fans, but it perhaps has the most to offer to those shocked into action by the senseless massacres we’ve endured over the past few years.
This particular moment has shined a light on a gun lobby that argues for maximum firepower and minimum responsibility. If history is any judge the moment will pass, and most of us will find ourselves again lost in our daily and particular business. When that time comes, there will be others of us who live in places where senseless shootings remain a corrosive constant.
Lamar’s album begins in such a place and tells the story of a teenage boy pursuing a girl with a mix of affection and lust. The character’s ordinary ambition differs little from that of teenagers who once piled into their parents’ car and turned the drive-in into a bacchanal. But Lamar’s lover’s lane runs through gang-infested Compton, Calif., and the make-out point is a deathtrap.
Hip-hop originates in communities where such hazards are taken as given. Rappers generally depict themselves as masters, not victims, of the attending violence. Their music is not so much interested in exalting to our preferred values as constructing a fantasy wherein the author has total control and is utterly invulnerable.
(More here.)
The work of the rapper Kendrick Lamar should enjoy heavy rotation in the White House these days. In this time of Tucson, Aurora, Colo., and Newtown, Conn., Lamar’s major-label debut album, “good kid, m.A.A.d city,” gives us a broad reckoning with the meaning of everyday gun violence unfolding far from the tragic spectacle. “Good Kid” has earned its share of praise from critics and hip-hop fans, but it perhaps has the most to offer to those shocked into action by the senseless massacres we’ve endured over the past few years.
This particular moment has shined a light on a gun lobby that argues for maximum firepower and minimum responsibility. If history is any judge the moment will pass, and most of us will find ourselves again lost in our daily and particular business. When that time comes, there will be others of us who live in places where senseless shootings remain a corrosive constant.
Lamar’s album begins in such a place and tells the story of a teenage boy pursuing a girl with a mix of affection and lust. The character’s ordinary ambition differs little from that of teenagers who once piled into their parents’ car and turned the drive-in into a bacchanal. But Lamar’s lover’s lane runs through gang-infested Compton, Calif., and the make-out point is a deathtrap.
Hip-hop originates in communities where such hazards are taken as given. Rappers generally depict themselves as masters, not victims, of the attending violence. Their music is not so much interested in exalting to our preferred values as constructing a fantasy wherein the author has total control and is utterly invulnerable.
(More here.)
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