By "The Truth"
April 13, 2005
Hip-hop is suffering. The culture in general is faltering. This is nothing new. Tales of violence and misogynistic undertones ruining America's youth have been a common complaint for years, but lately it's exploding in the mainstream media largely because the 50 Cent/The Game shooting at Hot 97 sparked the current uproar. The Reverend Al Sharpton held his first Town Hall meeting last weekend to discuss possible solutions to the problem. Shootings and criminal trials are all too common amongst the major players in this genre. Radio stations are being held under a microscope and landlords are threatening to evict dangerous entities. The entire issue is much too large to tackle in a single article. I am not even going to attempt that. What I am going to discuss here and now though is the element of being "real".
From as far back as I can remember one of the most common claims MCs and hip-hop artists would make in their rhymes was whether or not someone was "real". The term depicted someone who truly "lived the life". "The life" in this case was a reputable background of hustling, drug dealing, robbing, gangsta leaning and sometimes even shooting others in the streets of your hometown. In order to rap about being gangsta, you had to be a gangsta in the eyes of the record-buying public. No one wants to be accused of being a "studio gangsta". It's a major insult if someone says you only act tough on a mic. This is so ridiculous. Denzel Washington is not a joke because he is not really a corrupt cop like he played in "Training Day". He is actually a wonderful actor because he made you believe he was. Why can't it be the same with rap? Why must you actually have fought through a dark past in order to be considered talented? And why are we literally awarding those who have dealt crack to babies on street corners and done jail time for robbing and beating innocent victims? Being "real" is a good thing to these kinds of people. Repping yourself as real is like wearing a badge of honor. Therefore, boasting of one's "realness" is commonplace in many hip-hop lyrics, a sampling of which I've included below.
"Real Nig*as" by The Notorious B.I.G.
On the road to riches and diamond rings
Real nig*as do real things
Hanging wit the nig*as is the song I sing
Real nig*as do real things
"The Realest" by Mobb Deep
Yo when the gats reveal
You cats get peeled and that's the deal
Fu*k a bit*h-ass that switch has nig*as that lack the real When the slugs burst
G.Rap be aiming at your mug first
Nig*as is blood thirst
We'll see who get plugged worst
We dug earth
"Holla If You Hear Me" by 2Pac
To all my boyz
Know tha real from tha bustas
And the decoys
And if ya hustle like a real 'G'
Pump ya fists if ya feel me
Holla if Ya Hear me
Now please don't get it twisted. This is not the same as Jennifer Lopez declaring "I'm Real" in her 2001 song of the same name. In that case, Jenny from the block is only trying to prove to her fans that she is not just a Hollywood honey just because she now makes that Hollywood money. In hip-hop, being "real" evokes a sense of criminal behavior. Evidence of one being "real" can include a history of arrests and court cases, experience as a drug dealer, or a robbery inflicted past. When Jay-Z was accused of stabbing fellow record exec Lance Rivera in December of 1999, many surmised that this would only help Jay gain much desired street cred. Still to this day some people believe that Jay didn't even commit the crime but willingly took the rap in order to build his sparse rap sheet (no pun intended). A couple years later, when Jay and fellow rapper Nas traded barbs in a very public hip-hop beef, one of the main bones of contention for both rappers was whether or not the other had ever really been involved in drug dealing or had ever really held a gun. Fans laughed along with Jay-Z when he said "I showed you your first tec (a gun) on tour with Large Professor" in his battle song "Takeover", as if Nas not being familiar with holding and owning guns somehow made him less of a man.
On February 28, 2005, shots were fired outside of NYC hip-hop radio station Hot 97. There have been many rumors about what actually went down that night but the clearest picture seems to involve 50 Cent's disrespectful on-air talk of former G-Unit crew member The Game. Apparently The Game had mentioned on several occasions that he did not agree with 50's beef records recently released attacking both Jadakiss and Fat Joe. The Game said that he was not about that (meaning beefs with other rappers) and would step back if any altercations ensued over said beef. For this reason, many fans called him a punk. 50 and the rest of his G-Unit crew, including Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo, loudly denounced The Game as a baby, a fake gangsta, and a pus*y for not standing up to the confrontation with his team like he should have. Prior to the radio station nonsense, The Game's reputation was depleted even further when a questionable picture began rapidly circulating the internet. The often-emailed screen shot showed The Game appearing on the reality dating show "Change of Heart" with his then-girlfriend, who ultimately decided to have a "change of heart" and dumped him on the show. Animated tales of Game having platinum blonde hair and a tongue ring on the show became humorous industry fodder. Some Game-haters even claimed they saw him shed a tear after his girlfriend dropped him. Unfortunately for The Game, the culmination of all of the above led to him being referred to as "soft", or "fake". Therefore, 50 Cent did not want to be associated with him and dropped him from his team, despite that fact that only a month earlier his "The Documentary" album sold more than a million copies and was critically lauded by some as just what the West Coast needed to return to the forefront of hip-hop glory. Just because Game did not want to be connected to an insult song, he was now not worthy to be a G-Unit member, no matter how good of a rapper he really was.
A couple of weeks later Jadakiss released a song entitled "Checkmate" which, aimed at 50 Cent as retribution for his "Piggy Bank" song against Jada, included such lines as "Since when has it become cool to get shot and not shoot back" clearly aimed at 50's well-known history of being shot several times without there ever being any real reports of 50 ever shooting at anyone himself. No matter how you look at it, 50 Cent getting shot many times is a shame. No one should have to be targeted by such violent crime in their life. But why should he be downgraded in his fans' eyes as a joke just because he has never shot someone himself? Is that really bad? Would it make him a better man for having been involved in more gunplay? Not at all. It's a travesty that so many of our youth are even concerned with how many times their favorite rapper has been involved in violent altercations or been to jail. These are not badges of honor but instead badges of dishonor. Labeling yourself as a convicted felon is not cool and does not make you real. It makes you guilty of committing a crime, that's all.
In order for hip-hop to repair itself at this point, all of the pawns in its game need to dig down deep and change the foundation of what it is currently built upon. Punishing those that have been involved in violent acts by banning their music from radio and TV stations for 90 days as Rev. Al Sharpton has recently proposed is a start. But teaching the youth of America, as well as the current chart-topping rappers of today, that being real is not what life's about is even better. The fact that someone like an Eminem or a Nas hasn't actually dealt drugs themselves or someone like Kanye West is still close with his working-class-educated parents does not subtract from their talents as hip-hop artists and celebrated lyricists. It can only strengthen them. I firmly believe that our most talented wordsmiths of the future can and will be college-educated adults with a head on their shoulders and a distaste for violence. We can achieve this goal by starting from the bottom up and educating our friends, children, and fellow artists that denouncing someone for not being "real" is not cool. It's stupid and dangerous and can only lead to bad things. Work it out people.
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