Confessions of a Guilty Freelancer

My Rap Problems- and Yours?

First off, I am an OAF, an older American father. I’ve considered creating an organization, OAFS USA, but I decided I didn’t want to spend a lot of time with geezers like myself. I got married late, in my early forties; back then, my wife-to-be kept pointing out that less than ten percent of men had never been married by age forty. She is an economist, a fan of numbers. A few years after we were married we had a child, a boy, Joe. Joe is now fifteen (and I am sixty) and he is overscheduled, which I don’t mind, except that it makes me overscheduled. I often drive him around and he plays CD compilations consisting mainly of rap tunes on the car’s player. “I’m gonna get my gun!” Around our neighborhood here in South Bend, Indiana, young folks do often go and get their guns. We’ve had a number of black children gunned down by other black children. I, of course, dislike Joe’s taste in music, but can’t keep from recalling that my parents abhorred my music: The Beatles? The Rolling Stones? Janis Joplin? So, I try to temper my criticism–I don’t want to sound like too much of a hypocrite, or Bill O’Reilly. And I am aware while I’m putting up with Joe’s rap music I am driving him to his trombone lesson where he will be playing Rimsky-Korsakov. My Rap Problems– and Yours? 23 24 So, I let Joe listen to his music of choice. The sexual content and languageofalotofitshocksme–me,achildofthesixties!PeteyPablo’s “Freek-a-Leek” is one of the worst offenders. But language from sixandseven -year-oldsIheardinparksplayingwithJoeashewasgrowing up shocked me, too. (Of course, I never expected to see erectile dysfunctioncommercialsontelevision ,either.)Weliveinwhat’scalledan “urban” neighborhood, which translates into poor black people living within shouting distance of white college professors. There’salotofculturalandeducationaldistance,thoughnotmuch geographic. And what was I doing about it? Not much. Along with being an OAF, I am also a member of a few do-good organizations, but what I mainly am, is theoretical: though we occasionally do try to live what we preach. Ironically, the anti-rap tirades Joe hears from me sound similar to theonemadebyLudacris,arapstarplayingarapstar,inthefilm Crash. In that scene, Ludacris’s character sounds like Bill Cosby–or, for that matter, Bill O’Reilly–attacking rap for what it does to black culture. The irony is heightened because the speech is delivered shortly after he and his buddy have car-jacked a monster luxury SUV. I wondered, after Crash won the Academy Award for Best Film this year, whether a white screenwriter had penned that anti-rap monologue, or if a black writer had done it. In any case, the gangsta rap group Three 6 Mafia wontheOscarforbestsong,“It’sHardOutHereforaPimp.”Pickyour irony. Joe has forced me listen to Eminem and his band D12, and after a while I began to realize M&M (my preferred spelling) has some talent . He may even be the Bruce Springsteen of his generation, since they have had similar career trajectories: at first, great adulation, then backlash and a trough of neglect, then springing back as classic iconic figures. 25 But,mostoften,Ijustlistenandthinkperennialparentalthoughts: “What is the world coming to?” Joe had been getting the series ofNOW CDs, “contemporary” hits, and, for the last couple of years, they have beendominatedbyrapartists–SnoopDogg,Chingy,50Cent,anyone with a semblance of a hit. Joe would censor them for me, even though theNOW discswerealready“censored.”Joewillturndownthevolume when there are words he doesn’t want me to hear. Thatmaywellsoundcutetosome,butIdon’tthinkitis–Idothink it is life, though. Joe is an only child, so he gets a lot of attention–and slack. Taking him home from a Boy Scout meeting I encourage him to listen to the public radio jazz station (he is in a jazz band), but, no, he wants to listen to hybrids like Lincoln Park, Black Eyed Peas, and other rap-lite groups, which I criticize less. But,everythingismoreofthesame:whenIwasteenager,Norman Podhoretz made a splash with an essay he published in Commentary in February,1963entitled“MyNegroProblem–andOurs,”writingabout the pervasive racism he and his white friends weren’t able to shake, though they often denied its existence. Here I was, some forty years later, denouncing rap music, being superiortoallitsparts,rantingonabouthowitscommercializationwas ascynicalandasdamagingasMcDonald’sdietstopoverty-levelblacks. Myson’sgenerationdoesn’tthinklikemineandwhateverisracistinhis cohort doesn’t look like it did in the 1950s...