Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self Analysis

Music and society have always been closely related. For years now music has been apart of people’s everyday lives all around the world. Having so many different genres out there, it makes it easy to be appealing to so many different ethnic backgrounds. However, one type of genre in particular has seemed to grab the attention of a younger generation. Rap music has undoubtedly had its utmost impact on African American youth, since many of the performers themselves are African American. An overtly masculine culture dominates rap music and creates gender stereotypes that become abundantly popular to the youthful audience. Three constant themes that are found within the rap culture are encouragement of violence, the misogynistic representation of women, an extreme hatred of homophobia. Each theme plays a detrimental role in the process of defining black masculinity as well as shaping the values, morals, and beliefs that its younger audience adopts after tuning into this “gangster lifestyle”.

“Virgins,” a short story by Danielle Evans is a coming of age tale that details the arduous journey of upcoming womanhood taken by a young girl and her friend. This young girl is named Erica and her friend is named Jasmine they are both black teenaged girls living in a lower income neighborhood. As one reads, the question emerges of how Evans presents a commentary on the issues that girls on the verge of womanhood must overcome, appears. What aspects must be portrayed to fully paint a picture into this world? Danielle Evans uses teenage ideals of self worth, themes of maturity, and a common disregard of morals to present a commentary on the issues girls on the verge of womanhood must overcome to fully prosper.

The age of adolescence has become universally known as an awkward period of growth and socialization. The article “Saplings in the Storm,” by Mary Pipher, was published in 1995 and gives an interesting look into some of the issues faced by adolescent girls, but gives little evidence to support her claims or ways in which to encourage the self-confidence in adolescent girls. More recently, there has been further research looking into the reasons as to why girls become more depressed, endure a decrease in self-esteem, and lose their curiosity after puberty.

Parents were and still are on the fence of their kids listening to rap music. The explicit types of rap music are poisoning the minds of young teens and can even encourage them to act in the a violent manner or rebel. Although, that is for explicit lyrics, not all rap has explicit lyrics. Altogether, rap music does not encourage teen violence in any way and many individual artists even teach their audience how to act positively. Teenagers seem to click easier to song lyrics, whether it's country, rap, rock, or pop. It can affect teenagers in a positive and negative way, but violence being said in the lyrics does not cause an indication of aggression for the listener. The lyrics may describe their situation perfectly, what they go through and how they feel. That’s why we always have those catchy radio tunes stuck in our heads. Alison Churchill, a fan of rapper Eminem from Newsday feed shares her input on what it can do to younger peers. “But she thinks the song could have a positive impact, ‘if it can hit a nerve with a teenager and prompt them to go talk to someone about it.’ Because, Churchill says, ‘The more we talk about a subject, the easier it is to fix.’” If teens don't usually have anyone to talk to, it can cause an empty feeling of loneliness that can turn into urges of depression, anxiety, mental health issues. When rap music hits home for the younger generation it's telling them to open up to somebody and share what you have to say. Talking about something that is bothersome can be a great solution for those who need or want it.

First, Pipher blames the low self respect of adolescent girls everything from parents to peers, but mainly faults our society as a whole. We are all guilty of getting caught up in the media, television, and magazines. “Have you seen Rosie? She has lost so much weight!” “Oprah gained all of her weight back and more!” These are just a few of the comments that are made after watching two of the most watched talk shows. I know these comments sound harmless, but to a young girl who is struggling with the perfect body image these comments reinforce the importance of appearance. Pipher also points out that intelligent girls are more prone to depression because they are more aware of their surroundings and therefore more aware of the new constraints they face as they leave childhood. Our society idealizes tall, dark

It may be hard for a kid to understand why his parents didn’t want him or her listening to Pac or Biggie’s lyrics, but as their actions on TV and in music videos displayed the same notions, their fear only increased. For both artists, they had videos displaying women with nearly nothing on, smoking, drinking and carrying weapons, but kids people liked it. That’s why both of these artists are known as the best of all time. What they didn’t see though was the rising amount of disrespect towards women, increase in drug sales and an enormous increase in gun violence during this time. This is proven by Lindsay John, “The endemic of violence in the black community can be directly traced back to the whole irresponsible images of black masculinity which is fed to us through music.” (174) Along with the videos, they had concerts that displayed rash and harsh comments towards not only whites but also law enforcement. Like in this lyric by Tupac:

Doug E. Fresh, a popular beat-boxer in rap music today, has been quoted saying, “Hip-hop is supposed to uplift and create, to educate people on a larger level and to make a change.” Although this is the original intention of hip-hop music, public opinion currently holds the opposite view. Since the 1970’s musical artists have changed the face of hip-hop and rap and worldwide, people – mostly teens—have been striving to emulate certain artists and their lyrics, which has created negative stereotypes for hip-hop music and also for those who choose to listen to it. With vulgar lyrics referencing drugs, alcohol, sex, and aggression, it’s no wonder these stereotypes exist. However, is music really the direct cause of how teens act,

The history of hip hop is so revolutionary and has molded and altered over the years into something so “unique”. The music genius’ that paved the way for hip-hop would not be able to recognize what it has become today. There are many ways that the new hip-hop world has affected our society which involves fashion, rap lyrics, musicology, technology, crime, the way other races have accepted hip-hop, and sexuality. Of these, the newly unrecognizable music has dramatically altered our societies sexuality in a numerous amount of ways. The explicit lyrics and inappropriate music videos lead to influence the future of our society negatively.

Though rap started out as a force for positive social change, popular subgenres of hip-hop such as "gangsta rap" have since eroded much of the art form's value to society. Impressionable young people are negatively affected by rappers' obsession with guns, drugs, sex, and material possessions. Since record companies do not seem to care about negative content as long as it sells albums, parents should assume a greater role in regulating their children's listening habits. Hip-Hop is the proclamation that young people are independent and intolerant of what they consider to be adult society, which they frequently view as hypocritical.

A lot of the artists were “accused of such things as assault, drug dealing, illegal weapons possession, money laundering, and murder”. Rap music has caused many uproars in the music industry because of the language and sexual content. A lot of the rap records have the “Parental Advisory Explicit Content” sign because of how much sexual images, profanity, violence and drug use there is. But not all rap songs have sexual content. Some make good and healthy relationships. According to researchers in Florida International University, the more adolescents watch sexual images, it’s more likely for them to engage in sexual activity. But some researchers believed that it’s because of the sexual lyrics that make up the attitudes of us young adults.

Normal stereotypes of the rap music genre is to glorify a gangster image and a lifestyle of drugs, money, violence, etc. Tupac did touch address these topics in many songs but it was not to promote them as glamorous but rather to educate and make aware of the problems within the community.

During the 80s and 90s rappers did involve many of the “social” critiques that were being faced. Through out the lives of the emotionally damaged rappers there was usually a story to every one of the songs produced. Usually containing a background story, sometimes in form of prayer because the people that explain this, do not know in what other form to pray to God. Some may say that such rappers as in Tupac who believed that God was present even in the most pro founded depressing situations. Although rapped about many luxuries that were committed to the wants Tupac pertained, also did explore more into police brutality, poverty and corruption with the Government. Tupac was very concerned with the way society was being governed. Believing that the law had turned numb towards the minorities’ situation. Tupac began to think and contemplate. Tupac went through many hard dealing situations as well, thus coming back to why rappers feel as if the voice inside is silent and have no other way to be heard of. Music has been a greatly part of the “rappers” life allowing to express and talk through stories within the lives of one another. Not just to society but also to God. The form of prayer the rapper’s pertain is just a call for someone to hear and act. “There should be a class on why people are hungry.” (Tupac) Why Tupac feels that society does not teach the people about real life but nonsense? Felt that society was being taught extremely immoral and

Self-esteem has recently been defined by Silverstone as "the sense of contentment and self-acceptance that stems from a person's appraisal of their own worth, significance, attractiveness, competence and ability to satisfy their aspirations" (Silverstone 1992). Self-esteem is the degree to which a person values and respects themselves, and is proud of their accomplishments. Self-esteem begins to develop in childhood, but it solidifies and gains momentum during the turbulent and trying years of adolescence. The teenage years tend to be a crucial "make it or break it" period when it comes to self-esteem because it is at this time that youngsters are searching for an identity. If this process goes awry, the teen

In addition to the actualization of women, rap also promotes extreme violence and abuse towards women. Besides the ?mild? abuse the vast majority of rappers perpetually depict, some rappers display a loathing so deep it can only be classified as misogyny. In the song ??97 Bonnie and Clyde,? by Eminem, he says ?There goes mama, splashing in the water. No more fighting with dad, no more restraining order. Blow her kisses bye-bye, tell mommy you love her? (Bonnie). In a sinister fashion, the song goes on to describe how he murdered and disposed of his ex-wife with the assistance of his three-year-old daughter. Here the violence towards women crosses generations and involves the traumatic use and abuse of a three-year old girl. It promotes that violence, even toward our most vulnerable, is acceptable if they are female. Undeniably, the hip-hop culture?s perverse attitude towards the treatment of women has gradually been accepted by society. It seems society has been desensitized to the violence of rap by

Dove’s Self Esteem project was made for young girls because more young girls struggle with having low self-esteem between the ages of seven to seventeen than most people realize. Not having good self-esteem takes a toll on young girls and causes them to miss out on many opportunities while growing up. Dove stated “six in ten girls avoid participating in fundamental life activities because of concerns about the way they look”. I found this very