8 comments

1. 

   Comment by Galan A on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   Hip hop is often a highly sexualized art form. If you have trouble accepting that, then it’s easy to look down on it. Having said that, some of the artists do exhibit a tremendous amount of intelligence in their take on religious, political, and other social matters. You can’t paint hip hop with one big brush, which is what many who are troubled by it find easier to do than contemplating lyrics and making judgments about artistic merit.

2. 

   Comment by sca on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   I would say that it is no art, even though the definition of art is the expression of feelings. I personally do not believe this music can be defined as art. I would say it is just posing.

3. 

   Comment by annierose on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   posing and bling with young chicks. it’s sad that there are women willing to look that trashy for a buck. it’s even more sad someone is trying to call it art. imo, art should be thought provoking, a thing of beauty, or making a statement. the only statement hip hop makes is that it is ok to make someone look like a ‘** for a buck.

4. 

   Comment by baritenor_ricardo on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   I think that it goes both ways because for ppl like Kanye West and Missy Elliot it’s a art form, but for others it’s hustle.

5. 

   Comment by LeMat on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   Can’t it be both? Victorian oil paintings were explicitly objectifying women, but were also clearly a detailed art form. I don’t think you can get a straight answer here, because one doesn’t necessarily rule the other out.

   Now, do its merits outweight its flaws? That’s a more interesting question.

   I’d answer that it was certainly an art form at its inception - Run DMC, Grandmaster Flash, the Beastie Boys… that was art.

   Has it lost its ability to exist as a creative medium? Ask Taleb Kweli and Sage Francis; I don’t think so. There’s a very specific brand of (pretty bad, in my humble, unauthoritative opinion) hip hop that receives a lot more air time and mainstream attention that seems to have much less to say than hip hop-inspired slam poets and rappers that don’t make millions, and they’re no reason to throw out the whole medium as worthless.

6. 

   Comment by nodumgys on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   of corse

7. 

   Comment by sternman9000 on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   Hip Hop is a form a expression that allows people of a limited education to get into the spot light and make a statement. Regardless of what the statement is, they are making it and more educated people should listen because I really believe that these Hip Hop guys represent a good chunk of Mainstream Thought.

8. 

   Comment by Gypsy on February 9, 2010 at 12:13 am

   Like many things it didn’t start out that way…I mean sugar hill gang weren’t about that. "I don’t mean to brag I don’t mean to boast but we like hot butter on our breakfast toast" C’mon now. Yes there is a thing about taking 1/2 and busting them out, but I would just attribute that to men being men, and hip hop (as of now) is all about them. I mean I can only think of 4 hip hop females. Missy, M.C. Lyte, Da Brat, and Queen Latifa. I know they could be considered old school, but as a whole this is a "new" art form of American culture and it got a lot of years left…who knows what is possible.