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Is hip hop consumerist propaganda?
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| Krypton |
Before I go on, this is speculation, and I have nothing to back it up, but it's something to think about.
As most people know the US is a corporate state. Our economic reach is global and countries around the world keep the US dollar as a reserve currency. In other words, we're economically super powerful. This is NOT, I repeat, NOT without the support of the consumer within this country. Our entire economy is geared towards consuming, with much less emphasis on any saving. We are bombarded our entire waking hours with consumerist propaganda. Labels, commercials, print ads, billboards, bottles, etc. are always around to remind you of what you bought or should buy. Credit card companies possess our name and addresses and regularly sell them to each other so that we have junk mail from numerous vendors every week. They want us to spend, even if we are kept in a perpetual state of debt. They possess our spending records. Advertisements online are strangely designed to fit the user's spending pattern.
Then I was thinking... Mainsteam media, including record companies are owned by relatively few people. Case in point, Rupert Murdoch. Has anyone really listened to lyrics they hear on the radio or wherever and really took a second to ask yourself, "What does it all mean?"
"It's all about the Benjamin's baby..." -Diddy Combs
Well, what does it mean? I'll tell you what it means... It is the motto of consumerism. The dominant philosophy of this country is no longer theological in nature. The traditional theological philosphy has given way to a new philosophy in which everyone as an individual is judged not by spiritual worthiness (human dignity), but by how much one consumes. How many cars can you buy? How many jewels can you have on your body (and mouth)? How attractive is your body? Are your clothes in fashion? How much are you making at your job? The list goes on and on.
Well, making the hip hop/consumerism connection, the record industry is owned by group of few. Hip hop is rampant with glorification of consumerism. Gotta have diamonds in the grill, an iced out chain, the hottest shoes, the fancy car, the nicest clothes, the biggest house, the hottest girlfriends, the most money, and more money, and even more money. I'de say in a great number of tracks, the mention of money is almost ubiquitous.
"For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows." 1 Timothy 6:10
I bet everyone's heard of this saying? I'de be one to believe it for sure. The love of money is the root of all evil. ANd I believe we're headed down a path to distruction by our love of money, and our philosophy of consumerism. It will one day kill us in destroying our planet or destroying ourselves with WMDs. I swear to you this is the end of the road.
So finally I say, I consider mainstream hip hop, the most popular genre of music in the US as propaganda for a consumerist philosophy, and it is DAMN working!! |
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| Aristronica |
*yawn* yes hip hop sucks ass.
next question. |
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| eROs.au |
| Mainstream hip-hop is no more consumerist propaganda than any other mainstream pop music |
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| Krypton |
| quote: | Originally posted by eROs.au
Mainstream hip-hop is no more consumerist propaganda than any other mainstream pop music |
Well, I made the observation of how many times I heard a song mention a glorification of money or consuming. I'de have to say hip hop, rap, whatever you call it is the most prevalent when it comes to down to it. |
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| Beatflux |
| quote: | Originally posted by Krypton
Well, I made the observation of how many times I heard a song mention a glorification of money or consuming. I'de have to say hip hop, rap, whatever you call it is the most prevalent when it comes to down to it. |
From the MTV videos I've seen, I agree. |
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| Halcyon+On+On |
I think you're on the right path, but you're only seeing a part of it all.
Yes, hip-hop music and culture tends to be the genre of entertainment that espouses worship of personal power and financial independence. Perhaps this is a dry outlook, but it is necessary to question the nature of money in the equation as well. That is to say, it stands to reason that perhaps money is merely a means to an end - a sign of social influence and manipulation. It is sadly short-sighted that few see the correlation past the dollars waving in front of their faces, but it, in the case of Hip-Hop, is not much more than a prescription of social behaviour. It doesn't take much to realize that people are attracted to money and fame because of its subsequence - power. Power can mean a great deal of things, but in this case, it is the security of lifestyle, the insurance of prosperity and, at the heart of all, the guarantee of mating rights. Is it all about the money? Perhaps by word. but simplicity is the easiest form of prescription in this sense - the crux lies in a far more complicated region.
Hip hop's roots are in poor neighbourhoods. Regardless of the corporate front it has become, the prescription still has tradition in communities of blacks cast aside by a people who could scarcely govern themselves, much less know what to do with a culture and a race of people whom they were, quite frankly, afraid of. Eminence among culture is certainly not a new concept - it has always been in general fashion to be well-traveled, well-versed and well-mannered within one's sphere. If the transmission of white culture had penetrated black culture the most, it would most certainly have been from the white man's own supposed "root of all evil" - money. After all, values of independence, survival and pro creative potential know no race or society - they know only the sphere in which environment they are cast in.
Whatever you think of hip-hop, I think you are on the wrong track if you believe it's the heart of the fascist corporate issues infecting the western world. Hip-hop is not a crime any more than it is a crime to be of a different race, talk a different way, walk a different way, come from somewhere... different.
Is hip-hop greed? Not in and of itself. People are greed. People bring about what horrors lie in the world and people are what will bring about magnanimity as well. There is scarce an influence in this world that is devoid of greed, corruption, and its appeal to our nature as reproductive beings. The industries you should worry about are those lead by lost men, heirs to a tradition of hatred and violence and at the controls of a war machine which seeks to change and assimilate people at a level that cannot be combated by means of social guilt. Hip-hop isn't your enemy. |
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| Lilith |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
consumerism is the best display of real democracy at work.
you call yourself an economics student- haven't you already learned the need for capitalist enterprises to constantly grow? that growth relies on consumption. hell, all of capitalism relies upon consumption. why is consumption an inherently bad thing?
i fail to see the point of this thread.
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what is your speculation? that hiphop is US propaganda for consumerism? no more than any other privately owned good or service that we are inundated by.
secondly, a lot of US hiphop focuses more on gun violence and sex than it does on some weirdo consumerist agenda. how is it actually any different to any other genre of music?
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music is simply part of popular culture which we are inundated by every minute of every day.
a real economist would also know that those with the "consumerist agenda" (whomever they are) don't need one particular genre to act as their closet mouthpiece. rap might typify the consumerism rampant in the US, but it is merely an outcome of that, it has no causal effect.
capitalism works by creating and expanding new markets. the entire system relies upon "coveting thy neighbours donkey" and competition. i still fail to see exactly what your point is. capitalism is evil? i dont get it.
if this is a critique on consumerism then youre doing yourself a disservice by attempting to link it to hiphop. |
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| Darkarbiter |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lilith
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lol |
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| Lebezniatnikov |
| quote: | Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On
I think you're on the right path, but you're only seeing a part of it all.
Yes, hip-hop music and culture tends to be the genre of entertainment that espouses worship of personal power and financial independence. Perhaps this is a dry outlook, but it is necessary to question the nature of money in the equation as well. That is to say, it stands to reason that perhaps money is merely a means to an end - a sign of social influence and manipulation. It is sadly short-sighted that few see the correlation past the dollars waving in front of their faces, but it, in the case of Hip-Hop, is not much more than a prescription of social behaviour. It doesn't take much to realize that people are attracted to money and fame because of its subsequence - power. Power can mean a great deal of things, but in this case, it is the security of lifestyle, the insurance of prosperity and, at the heart of all, the guarantee of mating rights. Is it all about the money? Perhaps by word. but simplicity is the easiest form of prescription in this sense - the crux lies in a far more complicated region.
Hip hop's roots are in poor neighbourhoods. Regardless of the corporate front it has become, the prescription still has tradition in communities of blacks cast aside by a people who could scarcely govern themselves, much less know what to do with a culture and a race of people whom they were, quite frankly, afraid of. Eminence among culture is certainly not a new concept - it has always been in general fashion to be well-traveled, well-versed and well-mannered within one's sphere. If the transmission of white culture had penetrated black culture the most, it would most certainly have been from the white man's own supposed "root of all evil" - money. After all, values of independence, survival and pro creative potential know no race or society - they know only the sphere in which environment they are cast in.
Whatever you think of hip-hop, I think you are on the wrong track if you believe it's the heart of the fascist corporate issues infecting the western world. Hip-hop is not a crime any more than it is a crime to be of a different race, talk a different way, walk a different way, come from somewhere... different.
Is hip-hop greed? Not in and of itself. People are greed. People bring about what horrors lie in the world and people are what will bring about magnanimity as well. There is scarce an influence in this world that is devoid of greed, corruption, and its appeal to our nature as reproductive beings. The industries you should worry about are those lead by lost men, heirs to a tradition of hatred and violence and at the controls of a war machine which seeks to change and assimilate people at a level that cannot be combated by means of social guilt. Hip-hop isn't your enemy. |
Well said. Hip hop is not so much about money as it is about status, which can be obtained through how many women you have at your side, how many cars you drive, how big your house is, or how much cash you have on hand. |
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| nchs09 |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov
Well said. Hip hop is not so much about money as it is about status, which can be obtained through how many bitches you have at your side, how many whips you drive, how big your pad is, or how much cash money you have on hand. |
an easy FIX!! since im so street:toocool: |
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