For generations now, music has been a classic area of disagreement between parents and children. However, the issue of music and its potential to influence youth and culture has intensified a great deal since Elvis and his pelvis shook up parents throughout the country. Today, the soundtrack against which the lives of our teens and children unfolds is increasingly made up of the rhythmic glorification of the urban blight of street thug mentality, of drug culture and violence, and the degradation of women. Hip-hop is mainstream, the gangster-rapper the new king of cool.
Eager for their share of the discretionary income of the hip-hop influenced demographic, many in corporate America have set aside concerns about content, and have welcomed the genre and its representatives into their advertising repertoire. Dr Pepper/Seven-Up Inc., PepsiCo, Burger King, Gap Inc., and Levi Strauss & Co. are just a few of the mainstream corporations that recognize the profit potential in advertising campaigns that make use of rap music and gangster-style culture cues.
It is not only mainstream corporations that are anxious for a piece of the action. The Porn/Hip-Hop Connection, an article written by Dan Miller, an associate editor of Adult Video News, gleefully delineates the benefits to the pornography industry of partnering porn with hip-hop. Published in the print version of the magazine in September of 2002, Miller's article discusses the history of the affiliation, the positive effect on revenue specifically due to the fan base that the rappers bring with them, and the desire of the so-called "adult industry" to gain broader social acceptance by making use of the hip-hop industry's current mainstream status.
This is important to parents because a significant proportion of the rap music fan base is made up of teens and children. "Hip-hop videos," Miller points out, "regularly feature porn stars." Eminem, for example, included porn star Jenna Jameson in the video version of the song Without Me. Others in the genre that have used porn performers in their music videos include DJ Quik, Mary J. Blige and Jay-Z.
"The adult video world is so much what rap music is all about," said Snoop Dog, as quoted by Miller. Snoop Dog, a successful rapper with albums that have sold at multi-platinum levels, received the AVN Award for Best Selling Tape and Best Music in January of 2002. The pornographic video, titled Doggystyle, was a joint effort between Snoop Dog and Hustler Video and the first of a series of planned collaborations. With the video came - and here is the marketing magic that will tempt underage fans - eleven original and previously unreleased songs.
"The best part of it is," said Yella, a founding member of the rap group N.W.A., "Snoop opened up doors (with the Doggystyle video). People who buy regular music now are buying porn in record stores." With the success of Snoop Dog's video, other rappers have produced similar material. According to Miller's AVN article, Yella moved from violent gangster rap to producing porn in the 1990s.
Movement between the two industries is becoming more common, with porn stars becoming rappers, as in the case of India, and rappers becoming porn performers, as in the case of Chaos. It does seem, however, that it is only the less successful rappers that actually engage in sexual activity for the camera. The financial benefits of the partnering of porn and hip-hop appear be greater for the pornographers.
"You could have a horrible selling album but it would still sell 50,000. But if an adult video sells 30,000, it's incredible," said Aaron Gordon, president of Mojo Home Video, according to Miller. "I recognize that any time you can put a mainstream person, somebody who has success and fame, in an adult video, it's a guaranteed winner."
Mike Ramone, Editor in Chief of AVN, in an October 2002 editorial titled Porn is as American as Apple Pie, wrote that "porn is squarely in the American mainstream", citing 3.95 billion dollars in so-called adult sales and rentals for the year 2001. While the degree to which pornography is mainstream is both subjective and debatable, his words are a clear statement of the goals of the industry.
Who can blame the pornographers for feeling hopeful, for believing that they too can achieve cultural legitimacy? The mainstreaming of rap must be an inspiration to them. Imagine, a genre of music made up violence, drugs, promiscuity and vulgarity, its performers pitching soft-drinks to our children. Eminem, notorious for his violent, misogynistic, and profane lyrics has been nominated for five Grammy awards this year.
What, then, can a parent do to protect their children from the creeping influence of negative messages that are made that much stronger through mainstream status?
There are many concrete actions a parent can take. Listen to what your children listen to. Slang terms, which can often disguise drug or sexual references, can be researched via the Internet, as can the artists themselves. Doing business with stores that do not stock music with objectionable content or that, at the very least, have an enforceable policy against selling music with advisory labels to minors. A Google search for 'clean rap' revealed that a large number of rappers produce dual versions of their music, one theoretically being suitable for youthful listeners. Further investigation provided a variety of profanity-free alternatives with positive messages, including Christian rap.
More important, however, is communicating values and reality. Conversations about the values represented in music and how they compare to parental values are useful. Removing the glamour by teaching the reality will also provide a measure of protection. Volunteering with your older teen -- helping in homeless shelters or food pantries that serve those who've been impacted by the drug culture; or perhaps in a hospital, holding and rocking the premature, sick babies of teen or addicted mothers; or in low-income school districts, reading to or tutoring young children who may have lost one or both parents to the streets -- aside from teaching the value of service, these can provide a wealth of information about the realities of the lifestyle promoted by gangster rappers.
The bottom line is that if we impart values and truth to our children, they will have the power to stand firm against those who seek to profit from them through the illusion and deceit that is the foundation of gangster rap and pornography.