It implies that hip-hop culture is not of the same standard, which is a patronising and elitist attitude to both those making the music, and the listeners. Of course it doesn’t, and that insinuation is a backwards one for any artist to make.Įxcusing the behaviour of hip-hop artists on that basis makes the implicit assumption that hip-hop culture should not be held to the same standard as all the other parts of Western society. This concept is also racist in itself as if having dark skin and being from a certain socioeconomic background makes a person inherently prone to sexual violence and hatred. This is not only misguided, but doesn’t logically follow considering the majority of Tyler’s listeners seem to be straight white teenage boys, as verified in our review of his Melbourne show. People would have you believe that misogyny and homophobia in hip-hop are acceptable because they’re a part of “hip-hop culture,” something which is tied in with black culture, and anyone who is offended just “doesn’t get it”. What matters are his words, and the influence they have on his listeners.“He’s an incredibly talented artist, but that doesn’t mean that everything that comes out of his mouth is blameless.” For the record, no one is accusing him of the former, including Frank Ocean and OFWGKTA’s lesbian DJ Syd The Kyd. Whether or not he is genuinely a monster who hates gay people and rapes and murders pregnant women, or just an angsty kid with a big mouth, doesn’t change the content of his raps. There’s also an argument to be made that subtle, pervasive discrimination is far worse than an angry, confused nineteen-year-olds’ bravado. But the motivations of Tyler himself are almost irrelevant. There’s a lot of hip-hop, and a lot of music in general, that has a lot to answer for. Tyler, The Creator is a straight man, and therefore he is not in a position to decide if calling homosexuals faggots – 231 times on one album, incidentally – or proudly imagining himself raping women is acceptable to these groups of people.īut he didn’t invent teenage cruelty, and he definitely isn’t alone. How are his listeners supposed to believe that misogyny and homophobia, verbal or otherwise, is wrong, when they are constantly bombarded with cultural signifiers that it isn’t? When Tyler encourages his audience to chant “bitch, kill yourself” at a random woman who he “bumped in to” in the crowd at one of his shows, why wouldn’t his fans think this would be appropriate behaviour for them to partake in at another setting? Tyler, The Creator’s works create an ‘us against them’ mentality, and to be ‘us’ you have to be okay with what he advocates, no matter how badly it paints a picture of ‘them.’ “Tyler, The Creator’s works create an ‘us against them’ mentality, and to be ‘us’ you have to be okay with what he advocates, no matter how badly it paints a picture of ‘them’.” But the music makes these attitudes acceptable, and even desirable. That’s not to say, of course, that a perfectly normal, happy teenager will suddenly start mistreating women and gay people after listening to an OFWGKTA song. The content of his music, no matter how supposedly innocent the intentions may be, reassert the social norms that make these facts possible. It’s eminent to consider though that gay people are still not accepted enough to be legally married in Australia and most of America, and that 1 in 5 American women will be raped in their lifetime – half of them when they are still teenagers. This year also saw Tyler release his latest album ‘IGOR’ to critical acclaim.He has said that he writes controversial lyrics just to fuck with people and that his critics read too much into it. The comeback show was one of shock and awe, a lightning bolt that illuminates the mood of the time.” Reviewing the gig, NME concluded that “Tyler, the Creator is a provocateur. Since his ban was lifted, this summer saw Tyler return to the UK for a stellar show at London’s O2 Academy Brixton. But it was more the principle of: ‘Y’all really did this, over this? In comparison to other shit people do, that y’all let in?’ So I’m happy that I got back. I got treated like I was a murderer.It was kind of stupid, and after a while I was like: I don’t even want to come back. “I got treated like a terrorist,” he said. “Yeah. The new interview also saw Tyler speak of his experience of being banned from the UK by former Prime Minister Theresa May, after she claimed that his songs “encourage violence and intolerance of homosexuality” and “foster hatred with views that seek to provoke others to terrorist acts.”
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