Blog Post #11: Misogyny and Rap Music

In this past week’s interesting class, we talked about rappers and their “misogynistic” lyrics. After hearing the different sides of the argument from my classmates, I wanted to voice my own opinion on the matter. I went to high school in downtown Long Beach, right on the border of Compton (a notoriously ghetto city rappers such as NWA and Snoop Dogg have made infamous), so I have been exposed to this music for much of my life. From 2Pac to Kanye West, these artists rap about many different difficult subject matters, from drugs and murder to degrading women at clubs. Is this music misogynistic? On paper, maybe. But I believe that all rap music should be taken with a grain of salt, and realize the primary goal of these rappers is entertainment and not to degrade women.

"Money Maker" by Ludacris, an example of rap music that could be considered "misogynistic". Some of my best girl friends love to sing this song.

Honestly, it’s really difficult to call rap music misogynistic when most girls like the genre more than guys. Many of my female friends know the words to the most popular songs more often than my male friends, reflecting their indifference to the misogynistic lyrics. Also, if you want to call rap music misogynistic, you might as well throw in country and rock music while you’re at it. Most types of music have artists that will talk about women in a sexualized, somewhat degrading way, which, by definition, is misogyny. Lastly, these rappers have lyrics like this because it sells. Just like advertisers using sexualized women, if rap artists can rap about a girl “shaking her money maker” and sell records because of it, they will. I don’t think people realize that these rappers aren’t going out into the streets and treating women badly in real life, and it’s just for show. All in all, I don’t believe rap music is misogynistic as everyone in our class claimed it to be. 

If "Money Maker" is considered mysogynistic, wouldn't "Country Girl (Shake it for Me)" by Luke Bryan be considered just as degrading?

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