0:00

Support for this podcast comes from Amazon

0:02

Prime. Being a Prime member

0:04

comes with a ton of perks, especially during Prime

0:06

Big Deal Days. This two-day

0:09

shopping event will give Prime members exclusive

0:11

deals on all the things they love, from

0:13

fashion, electronics, home goods,

0:16

you name it. And that can make you feel

0:18

like a big deal.

0:19

So don't miss out on two days of big

0:21

savings. Join Prime now, just

0:24

in time for Prime Big Deal Days, happening

0:26

October 10th and 11th. Learn

0:28

more at amazon.com

0:30

slash Prime Big Deal Days.

0:44

Welcome to In Her Shoes. I'm Lindsay

0:46

Peoples, and I'm Editor-in-Chief of The Cut. On

0:49

this show, I get to talk to people that we love

0:51

and admire or some that we just find interesting.

0:54

We'll explore how they found their path and

0:56

what maybe have gotten in their way and

0:58

how they brought others along now that they've arrived.

1:06

Hey. So here at The Cut, we've

1:08

been doing a lot of coverage on hip-hop, turning 50,

1:11

and celebrating where the genre is today. We've

1:13

had covers this year with Glorilla, Young

1:15

Miami from the City Girls, and we've talked

1:18

about up-and-coming artists like Sexy Red and

1:20

Ice Spice. Ski is

1:22

one of my favorite songs of the year, so we had

1:25

to, right?

1:29

And on this episode, we'll hear from Bevy Smith

1:32

and Debra Lee

1:33

tell us what hip-hop, turning 50, means to

1:35

them.

1:38

Bevy Smith has always been tuned into the culture

1:40

and was incredibly instrumental in platforming

1:42

hip-hop artists in her roles at Vibe and

1:44

Rolling Stone. But being a Harlem native,

1:46

she was able to take us back to the early days and,

1:49

of course, her fondest memories.

1:54

I have to ask, since we're doing a ton of 50 Years of Hip-Hop stuff at

1:56

The Cut, obviously, what's the most important thing that you've

1:58

learned from The Cut? You

2:01

have been a big part of hip-hop

2:03

being in culture the way that it is. We

2:06

did Glorilla earlier this year.

2:08

We did I spice. We just did Carisha

2:11

on a cover. Did

2:13

you ever think hip-hop was going to be as big

2:16

as it is today? Well,

2:19

so I'm

2:20

from Harlem. Hip-hop starts in the Bronx

2:23

though and that's like literally next door.

2:25

So I'm

2:26

there at the beginning. So hip-hop is

2:28

my music. So when I tell people all the

2:31

time, me and Oprah are only 10 years

2:33

apart, but she's

2:36

a different generation, totally.

2:38

Like we can't, like musically

2:41

we have nothing, you know.

2:43

But

2:44

my niece is 28 and

2:46

I'm 56 and we see

2:48

each other musically and it's hip-hop

2:50

that's the connective tissue. So

2:55

when I was a kid, I knew how it made me feel.

2:58

And then as an adult, like,

3:00

you know, as a young adult,

3:03

I was a hip-hop party. Slaying

3:08

the tunnel, slaying

3:10

the rest, slaying all the things and

3:12

all the hardest rappers. Baby,

3:16

I was

3:20

that one. I was that girl. I was

3:22

everywhere. I was an Instagram

3:24

star before there was an Instagram. I was going to say.

3:27

Okay. So

3:30

there's that. But then I go into

3:32

vibe and that's when my fashion

3:35

world collides with my hip-hop

3:38

party world. And it's amazing

3:40

because that vibe, I then get to

3:43

go with artists to Paris

3:45

and introduce them to brands

3:48

and people and all of

3:50

that. Right. And so I'll

3:53

never forget when Emile did Lil'

3:55

Kim for the cover. Never forget.

3:58

Ever. He

4:00

had Donatella Versace make her custom

4:03

thing, but he wanted her to wear Blahnik's. And

4:07

ironically enough, they just couldn't find any shoes

4:09

at Manolo Blahnik. And

4:12

then

4:13

Iman was the Julie

4:16

Editor-at-Large at Five at the time. And

4:19

he let Iman know this. Iman

4:21

calls Mr. Blahnik himself. And

4:24

Mr. Blahnik sends over. All of a sudden there's a

4:26

boatload of shoes from Blahnik.

4:28

You know what I mean? But I knew

4:30

that we were, I knew that hip-hop

4:33

was going to be huge because

4:36

I saw from the beginning how

4:38

it electrified people, how

4:41

it inspired people.

4:44

And I saw through all the different changes,

4:48

the one thing that was the common

4:50

thread was that it

4:52

was an undeniable music of the

4:54

people. And

4:57

anything for the people, it's

4:59

always

4:59

going to resonate.

5:00

I hate that

5:03

we're going backwards on the money part

5:05

of it though. In artists

5:07

making the money? I hate that we're going

5:09

backwards on that. But

5:11

I like that we are seeing more of

5:13

the artists taking control of their brands

5:16

and their branding. I'm very

5:18

happy to see that because for many years

5:20

we were just sitting around trying to get free

5:23

sneakers from somebody in a jean

5:25

suit. So, baby.

5:30

Deborah Lee saw the genre evolve

5:32

from the streets of New York to the screens of our television.

5:35

When we had Deborah on the podcast, she

5:37

talked about her memories of hip-hop's evolution during

5:40

her time at BET. This

5:44

year is also 50 years of hip-hop celebrations, which

5:46

BET was obviously so instrumental in and

5:49

just putting a lot of the hip-hop

5:51

artists and giving them the platform

5:54

that they deserve. So can you tell me about, when

5:56

you first started broadcasting hip-hop, did

5:58

you ever start broadcasting hip-hop programs? and music

6:01

and what that felt like in the

6:03

beginning for you? Well,

6:06

I always say when we first started, I joined

6:08

BET 1986. They

6:11

were already showing videos, but they

6:13

were videos by Earth, Wind and

6:15

Fire and Aretha Franklin

6:17

and Whitney Houston. And

6:20

so all of a sudden here comes hip-hop. And

6:23

we started a show called Rap City. I

6:27

think in the early days, you know, think of LL

6:30

Cool J and

6:31

some of those early rappers.

6:34

And it was good-hearted.

6:36

It was fun. And

6:38

then came Gangster Rep. And

6:41

we had to deal with, well, do we show

6:43

guns on the air? So we

6:46

decided to blur out all the guns,

6:49

try to stick with hip-hop, even though

6:51

it was changing. And

6:53

then the negative images of

6:56

women started. And

6:58

that was a tough time, especially after

7:01

Don Imus called the

7:03

Rutgers female basketball

7:06

team something horrible. And

7:09

then his people criticized

7:11

him. And then his response was, well,

7:13

the rappers call them bitches all the time. Why

7:15

can't I call them bitches? And so

7:17

that put more heat on the music

7:20

industry and BET. And

7:22

we were sort of seen as the conduit

7:25

for hip-hop. I mean, MTV had Yo! MTV

7:29

Raps, and they were showing some of it. But

7:31

when the criticism started, it was

7:34

leveled at BET. So

7:36

that's when we started the standards

7:39

committee and started being

7:42

tougher on videos. And

7:45

R&B was still kind of there, but not

7:48

as popular. So

7:50

it was a really tough time, especially since

7:52

so much of our programming was

7:54

based on videos.

7:56

But then the

7:58

rappers started growing up. Jay

8:00

Z, Ludacris, Natalie, I

8:03

would look at the front row of the

8:05

hip-hop awards and the guys had

8:07

on suits all of a sudden instead

8:09

of basketball jerseys They

8:12

had wives with them or girlfriends

8:14

Beyonce was there Kim Kardashian

8:16

was there and the first time

8:18

I noticed that I was like Wow, we

8:20

may be able to get out of it They're

8:23

having daughters of their own They're

8:26

focusing on other businesses

8:28

and it made me proud that

8:30

Seeing that site and how many

8:33

of these guys turned into business people

8:35

really made me proud and they were

8:37

always great to me They would call me the Queen

8:39

and you know Buster Rhimes would bow

8:42

when I passed by and I would go to the

8:44

hip-hop awards to show them That

8:46

a black woman was in charge and

8:49

then one time I went maybe after about five

8:51

or six years And I looked around the room

8:53

and I was like, this is not getting better It's

8:56

still 90% male and

8:58

I just said I'm not going back anymore. I was like, I'm 60

9:01

years old I'm too old for this and that's

9:03

when I started leading women to fine I said

9:05

I'm gonna get women together and we're gonna talk

9:07

about something other than hip-hop

9:10

lyrics, but it's hit 50

9:12

years Which

9:14

is incredible and I had goosebumps

9:17

just like everybody else when the Grammys did

9:19

that tribute 50 years

9:21

in hip-hop. It was so

9:22

authentic and so real and

9:24

you know, it's part of our culture

9:27

and You know, we either had

9:29

to keep putting pressure on them to Do

9:32

better but it's not going anywhere, you

9:35

know early on people thought it wouldn't last but

9:37

it's here with us 50 years later And

9:40

it's really incredible So

9:43

Deborah isn't alone in her feelings on reckoning

9:46

with the way women are represented in hip-hop And

9:48

it's something that we've

9:49

talked about a ton on the cut when

9:51

we come back We'll hear a conversation on the vulture

9:53

podcast about how we grapple with misogyny

9:56

as the art form turns 50 support

9:58

for this podcast

9:59

to the immigrant. This

10:02

evening, everyone loves a little

10:04

VIP treatment. Whether it's

10:07

a stranger holding your door or an edge shouldn't

10:09

have it in your order, it's a reminder that your

10:11

parents are dead. So

10:14

now, during Prime's big deal days, still

10:16

let's be open. VIP with its

10:18

legal savings is just for Prime members.

10:21

Join Prime today, just in time for Prime's

10:24

big deal

10:24

days. Two-day shopping

10:26

event offers personal suggestions.

10:30

Prime's big deal day is happening October

10:32

10th, 2011. So, as we reminisce

10:35

on the impact of hip-hop, we can't ignore the

10:37

sexism

10:37

that's always

10:45

existed

10:48

in the genre. We're

10:55

not seeing the bigger picture, which is

10:57

that hip-hop needs to be seen as

10:59

something that is, you know, as

11:01

beautiful and as creative and as innovative as

11:03

it is. It is still something that still

11:05

has its flaws. And the major

11:08

flaws have to do with women

11:10

and queer folks. That's Kiana Fitzgerald. She's

11:13

a hip-hop scholar and journalist, and

11:15

she recently published a book all

11:17

about hip-hop at 50. My

11:19

colleague Sam Sanders over at Vulsar talks

11:21

with filmmaker Zreen Hampton to unpack. With

11:24

all that hip-hop has given to the culture and the world, how

11:26

do we reckon with misogyny and homophobia?

11:29

Here's their conversation. Have there

11:31

been any parts of this anniversary

11:33

celebration of hip-hop so far that have really just

11:36

felt the most, I don't know,

11:38

problematic to you? Like, I keep thinking

11:40

of these instances

11:43

of, like, middle-aged male rappers hanging

11:45

out with law enforcement or, like, former law enforcement.

11:50

Like, you know, you got KRS-1 freestyle

11:52

rapping for Mayor Eric Adams, a former New

11:54

York police officer. You got

11:57

Lil Wayne singing Mrs. Officer

11:59

in front of the police. Kamala Harris, who

12:01

during her time as AG in California was

12:04

known as California's cop-in-chief.

12:07

It feels weird. Were there any moments

12:09

for you that you were like, oh my god, this is not

12:11

right? Oh man. Those

12:14

are two great examples of me being

12:16

like WTF. Like what

12:19

is actually happening in my face? Especially

12:22

for a genre that is

12:24

so like in WA, as

12:27

the police, like you know this is something that we

12:29

are very very aware has been deeply

12:32

involved in hip-hop since the beginning of this

12:34

aversion to police and

12:36

being avoidant of them and being critical

12:39

of them. So it's like you know these decades

12:41

later what's what is that about? Like what are

12:43

we really doing? I remember watching the

12:45

Grammys and perusing

12:46

social media as one does during

12:48

those events. And Dr.

12:51

Dre was presented with the Global Impact Award.

12:54

I know everybody in here probably

12:56

knows this already but this is the

12:59

50th anniversary of hip-hop.

13:01

And

13:07

it was like oh so we're really celebrating

13:09

outright an abuser who has admitted

13:12

to his abuse. And that's just

13:14

kind

13:14

of one example of an artist who

13:16

has been championed year

13:18

after

13:18

year, decade after decade for really making these

13:21

huge impacts on hip-hop and not really tipping

13:24

the scales in order to say

13:26

well this is what he's accomplished but this is also what

13:29

harm he's done. And that conversation

13:31

happens here and there in certain pockets of the internet

13:34

but it doesn't really happen on the

13:36

stages and it doesn't happen in the

13:39

performances. It doesn't happen in you

13:41

know the places where more people

13:42

will see it and hear it. It's more

13:45

critical pieces that don't get the attention that an

13:47

award show or something like that would have.

13:50

Yeah well and when you think about all these

13:53

now middle-aged legends of hip-hop who are

13:55

being honored in 2023 all the early stuff

13:59

was really mean.

13:59

to women and gay people and they never

14:02

had to apologize for it. You know Tribe Called

14:04

Quest had a song about date rape.

14:13

KRS-1

14:16

had a song that was kind of slut-shamy,

14:19

you know, Jay-Z, Biggie,

14:22

Tupac. They all had lyrics that were demeaning

14:24

to women and over time

14:26

everyone just forgot about it, you know? There

14:29

was never an answering for that. They just kind

14:31

of stopped doing it.

14:32

Yes, exactly. When you say

14:34

Jay-Z, I think of Girls, Girls, Girls, I think

14:37

of Big

14:37

Pimpin, which is one

14:39

of my favorite songs because UGK is on

14:41

it and I love UGK. But,

14:43

you know, Jay-Z pretends like those songs

14:45

don't exist anymore. And it's like,

14:48

well, we remember, you know, the videos are out there.

14:50

It's still on streaming, like it has not

14:52

gone away. But I think as these

14:54

artists mature, they kind

14:57

of

14:57

come to terms with some of their material

14:59

and they're like, ooh, that wasn't a good look.

15:01

Maybe I should just pretend like it doesn't exist.

15:03

And that's not how the world works. That's

15:05

not how the internet works. And people

15:08

have very long memories. So I

15:10

think in their efforts and their attempts

15:12

to kind of reconstruct their own histories,

15:15

they're doing more harm than good because at

15:18

the end of the day, we know what we heard, we

15:20

know who we saw. So it's like, just

15:22

because these events have gone

15:25

by and they've, they're 10, 20,

15:27

30 years old now, it doesn't mean that they never

15:29

happened.

15:31

Yeah. I want to talk about this

15:33

kind of weird dichotomy of women and

15:36

hip hop. Hip hop has generally

15:38

been mean to women, but women

15:41

have also always been there for

15:43

hip hop. You know, even the first party

15:46

that was believed to be the start of hip hop and

15:48

hip hop DJing, DJ Kool

15:51

Herc party. It

15:53

was his sister Cindy's party. The

15:55

party where hip hop started, a woman threw

15:57

the party, right? Like how symbolic

15:59

is that? that. Knowing

16:02

that and knowing that history, if you

16:05

had to sum up hip-hop's relationship to

16:07

women in 30

16:10

seconds or less, what would you

16:12

say?

16:14

Whew. Hip-hop

16:16

has been very unkind, to

16:18

say the least, to women. It

16:20

has,

16:20

from the very beginning, tried

16:23

to ostracize them, tried

16:25

to make them feel like they didn't belong, tried

16:28

to make them feel like if they were involved, that

16:31

they should be lucky to be there. And

16:33

not only that, the women who were

16:35

included were told that they had to look

16:37

a certain way, that they had to dress a certain way. There

16:39

were so many parameters that were involved

16:43

in the policing of women in hip-hop that

16:45

are still existent today. And I think that's

16:47

why we've seen this explosion of hip-hop

16:49

artists currently who are women

16:52

and who are really just not able

16:54

to take the microphone and say, hey, I'm here

16:56

and I'm going to tell you about my experiences

16:58

and the way that I've lived it. I think

17:01

all of these elements that have been

17:03

thrown together in this great melting

17:05

pot of hip-hop, it's an exciting adventure

17:08

for women, contemporarily because of

17:10

all the walls and the berries that have been broken.

17:13

But at the same time, they're standing on the

17:15

shoulders and

17:16

on the halos of some

17:18

women who will never get the credit

17:20

and the acclaim that they deserve.

17:22

Yeah. And I mean, when I asked

17:24

this question about how hip-hop treats women,

17:26

it's also a question about how

17:29

hip-hop treats queer people, which

17:31

is maybe even worse. I remember it

17:35

wasn't until I was in high school, and I'm 39 now,

17:38

it wasn't until I was in high school when

17:40

rap kind of decided to stop saying

17:42

the word faggot. Yeah. Like, that was

17:44

a big deal. And even then, it kind

17:47

of stopped, but you still don't see queer

17:50

rappers prominently in the industry.

17:53

No, we don't. And I'm so glad you brought

17:55

that up. As I was doing

17:57

research for the book,

17:59

I heard so many efforts, so

18:02

many efforts, and I was like, wow, I did not, like

18:04

I knew that it was prevalent, but I didn't

18:06

know that it was that of

18:08

a- Everyone was doing it. Everyone, everyone.

18:10

Literally, the people that we respect to

18:12

this day were doing it. It's

18:14

mind-blowing how just, how

18:17

cavalier people were about it, how

18:20

it was just like something that rolled off the tongue very

18:22

easily. And I was just like, wow, this is frightening

18:25

to hear. So I'm glad that we're

18:27

in a place where it's not as

18:29

weaponized, but it still is very much present.

18:32

But yeah, I feel like today we don't

18:35

have nearly the amount of queer

18:37

artists in representation that we could have. We

18:39

do have the people who are very

18:42

visible, like Alilah Nas X, and

18:44

then we have other folks like Kegz Tequila.

18:46

We have Rah-Rah

18:47

Gabor, who I love, who identifies as

18:49

gender fluid from New Jersey. There

18:53

are so many artists who are like creating

18:55

at every level of the genre,

18:58

but they're not giving the resources. They're not giving

18:59

the attention, the

19:02

developmental

19:03

attention that they need to become

19:05

the artists that they could be. They're really just

19:07

having to go out here and just get

19:09

it how they live by themselves. And that

19:12

does not always equate to art

19:14

that is appreciated on a global

19:17

level. So I can only

19:19

hope that in the next 50 years, not to sound

19:21

cliche, but I hope that

19:24

as we move forward, that it will

19:26

become much

19:26

more inclusive, that it will become much more diverse

19:29

in every single way that is utterly

19:31

possible. Because hip hop

19:34

is all about giving voice to the voiceless,

19:36

which as journalists, we know that

19:38

phrase very well, but for people

19:40

outside of our profession, that's

19:42

what hip hop has become. It's become this very,

19:45

very instrumental tool to help

19:47

people to turn their lives and their experiences

19:50

into something bigger, something relatable, something

19:52

that anybody could listen to and say, I feel

19:54

that, I've been through that. So that doesn't

19:56

just come down to

19:57

straight men. That's not how... That's

20:00

not how the world works. So I

20:02

can only hope that moving forward, we will see

20:04

much more inclusivity.

20:06

I wanna talk about some of the rules

20:08

that have existed for women in hip hop and if

20:10

they're changing, especially in this

20:12

moment where we have so many

20:15

women rappers kind of dominating. But

20:17

it seems like when women

20:20

have been allowed to be a part

20:22

of hip hop and rap, there's been a

20:24

certain script they've had to follow. They

20:28

have to be co-signed by some male rapper or

20:30

some male led crew. And then they could

20:32

be the only woman in that crew. And

20:35

then they'd have to fight rumors that

20:37

they slept with the crew to make it their entire

20:39

career.

20:40

I never fucked Wayne, I never fucked Drake,

20:43

all my life, man, fuck's sake.

20:45

And if they were good lyricists,

20:48

the thinking would always be that some man

20:50

was writing their lyrics for them. And

20:52

on top of all of that, they had to be hot,

20:55

dress sexy and dance. It

20:58

was kind of wild. Every woman in

21:00

hip hop had to do all of those things

21:02

and still wouldn't be respected by

21:05

the men of hip hop. How

21:08

much of that is still the case? Has it gotten better

21:10

or worse? I don't know.

21:12

Yeah, I mean, I will say that

21:15

it is unbelievable the standards

21:17

that women are held to when compared to their

21:20

male contemporaries. I,

21:23

gosh, even just working in hip hop

21:25

media for as long as I have, I've

21:28

been in offices where we've brought in artists

21:31

of all kinds. And the men come in and

21:34

they're, how they look and they talk

21:36

how they talk. And it's like, all right, you're

21:38

just here to be here. And then the women come

21:40

in and they're pristine, they're dressed, they're wearing

21:42

heels, their makeup is on point,

21:44

they're talking like they've been

21:46

through a media machine. It's so different,

21:49

it's so markedly

21:50

different than the way that

21:52

they have to present themselves. So to your

21:54

point about the history of women having to be

21:56

attached to a man

21:58

or a male crew and then having to. to jump

22:00

through all these hoops additionally. That,

22:02

I just thought about Lil' Kim, I thought about Nicki Minaj,

22:06

two of the most championed women artists

22:09

in hip hop. I thought about them and

22:11

I thought about what must they have gone through that

22:13

we don't even know. We just see

22:15

the surface level, we just see the optics

22:18

of it and we're like, ooh, that must have been very hard

22:20

to deal with. But there's probably so much

22:22

more that they've never talked about. On

22:24

top of that, I would say in

22:27

current times, I feel like it's very

22:30

exciting for me personally, just to

22:32

observe the way that women are coming into the

22:34

fold. We have Scar Lip,

22:37

who is getting co-signed by male artists, but not

22:39

necessarily connected to a

22:41

male crew. Fly on a boss.

22:43

Fly on a boss. I'm not

22:45

a sin again. I said I love you to

22:47

that never, I'm not a sin again. I'm

22:49

baby sugar spiced and I come out in

22:51

cinemas. And my bestie are the same,

22:54

like a synonym.

22:55

Who are just running around

22:57

and having a great time working with Missy

22:59

Elliott already. So we have these

23:02

new crops of characters

23:03

who are coming up and they're not

23:05

having to necessarily be attached to

23:08

these old antiquated tropes and

23:10

these old ways of thinking and living and moving

23:12

throughout the industry. So I think

23:15

right now

23:16

is probably the most excited I've been

23:18

in a very long time when it comes

23:20

to new artists. And we

23:23

don't even have to say new women artists or new female artists,

23:25

like just new artists. I'm just super excited

23:27

to see these women like picking up the baton

23:30

and running with it literally. Yeah.

23:34

I look at hip hop now and I see two

23:37

big trends. All

23:39

the men are like in a bad mood. Travis

23:41

Scott's in a bad mood. Drake's in a bad mood.

23:44

The dude's in a bad mood. And the women

23:46

are having fun.

23:46

Cardi's having fun. Megan's

23:49

having fun. Nicki's having fun. Doja's

23:51

having fun. And

23:53

they are topping the charts. Their songs are

23:56

getting all the radio play. And partner

23:58

wants to say, oh, this means the women have...

23:59

have won,

24:01

but I'm not sure because

24:03

when I look at what these women

24:06

have to do, it's still

24:08

so much more than the myth. Cardi

24:11

B has to be a

24:13

stand-up comedian on top of just rapping.

24:16

Megan Thee Stallion has to be the most beautiful

24:18

woman in the world. Doja

24:21

Cat sings and

24:23

dances and raps and is a

24:26

weird girl and is an art girl. And

24:29

the boys just get to sit there and mumble. And

24:32

so in that reality, should

24:36

I say, look, the women

24:38

won or should I say, damn, it's

24:41

still not fair for the women. Cardi B

24:43

Oh my God, I'm just like, you just kind of blew my

24:45

mind because

24:45

I'm like, on the one hand, yes, the

24:47

women are winning and it's so much fun and I'm having

24:49

the time of my life, but it's also like, at

24:52

what cost? Like, as you said,

24:54

they're having to do so much

24:56

and carry so many burdens and maybe

24:59

not even necessarily traditional burdens, but

25:01

burdens nonetheless of having to, you

25:04

know, outperform, out look,

25:06

out rap, out this, that and the third. Like

25:09

women have always had to do this, but

25:11

I think now it's probably

25:13

just become so standard to us to see women

25:16

accomplish and go leaps and bounds above

25:18

everybody else because that's

25:21

what they've always had

25:22

to do. So I'm glad that you brought

25:24

up that dichotomy of, you know,

25:26

they're winning, but why are they winning?

25:29

Like, is it because they have to

25:30

go above and beyond and, you know,

25:32

surpass everything that a man has ever done

25:35

in this industry? And I feel like

25:37

if women artists really

25:38

did sit back and think about all that they

25:40

do, they'd be like, man, why

25:42

did I have to do this? Like they would, it's

25:44

one of those things where it's like, you go mad if you think

25:46

too much about this specific topic. And

25:49

yeah, and we know that very well.

25:51

So yeah, it's, it

25:53

also reminds me of the saying within

25:56

the black

25:56

community, you know, you have to be twice as good to get

25:58

half as much.

25:59

even more the case

26:00

for women rappers, especially

26:03

black women rappers.

26:04

Yeah, yeah. You know,

26:07

in a recent profile in the Atlantic, one of hip

26:09

hop's biggest critics, Dream Hampton,

26:12

she was talking about all these prominent women in

26:14

rap and hip hop right now. And

26:17

she's like, I'm not sure if all of it's great.

26:20

Like, she talked about Cardi B. And

26:23

she said, actually, Cardi B is incredibly

26:25

conventional. I don't cook,

26:27

I don't clean, but let me say I got

26:30

this ring.

26:31

Like Cardi B is performing womanhood

26:34

in service of a man, her

26:37

lover, her husband. And like, a

26:39

lot of what the most prominent

26:41

women in hip hop have to do is

26:44

perform their womanhood and perform

26:46

their fun for the male

26:48

gays. How

26:51

true is that? Or are these actually women

26:53

who are doing it for themselves and for other women?

26:56

I feel like women have

26:58

always had to do

27:00

what they have to do in order to

27:02

make it. And if that means,

27:05

you know, like Atrina working with a trick daddy.

27:13

And having to deal

27:15

with all of his antics, I think

27:18

about them and I think about all of the things

27:20

that they've had to go through in order to get a

27:22

voice and to be someone who can speak

27:24

to the masses and change lives. When

27:27

I think about all that, it just feels

27:29

like a weight, you know, it feels like a weight

27:32

on me to think about it. And if

27:35

I'm feeling that way, I know it has to be a weight

27:37

on them. So for these artists

27:39

to, you know, create music

27:42

that speaks to their personal lifestyles,

27:44

if Cardi B is in love and head over heels

27:47

for her husband, then that's

27:49

her way of life. You know, if she truly feels

27:51

that way, if it's all performative, then that's

27:53

another story. But, you know, if that's

27:55

how she feels and that's how she wants to relay her lifestyle,

27:58

then who are me to judge?

27:59

I am just one person. But

28:02

I do understand where Dream Hampton

28:04

is coming from. I do understand

28:07

her very, very wealthy

28:10

investment into hip hop and all the work

28:12

that she has done. But at the same time,

28:14

I do acknowledge that. When I hear Megan talking

28:16

about shaking ass and twerking

28:19

and having fun with her body, when

28:21

I spoke to Megan the first time, she told

28:23

me that she doesn't wanna rap about

28:25

popping pills and killing people because that's not what she

28:27

does.

28:29

So why can't she rap about what

28:31

she likes to do? What she likes to do. Yeah, so

28:33

that's, when I hear conversations

28:36

like that, that's what I think about. I think about

28:38

the lifestyles that these women are

28:39

living and their freedom to

28:42

explain and to convey it in the way that they feel

28:44

is accurate to them.

28:46

Yeah.

28:47

You know,

28:49

on the one hand, hip hop seems to be a

28:51

better place for women now because

28:53

you have artists like Cardi and Megan

28:56

and Doja succeeding. But

28:59

the most prominent men in rap,

29:01

they haven't been as supportive of women as you

29:04

think they would be in 2023. When I

29:06

think about Drake, probably the biggest rapper,

29:08

male rapper of our current

29:10

moment, seems like

29:13

every few months he says something that's kind of patently offensive

29:15

to women. Whether it's about Serena, whether

29:18

it's about Megan, he's

29:21

not someone who seems

29:23

to be feminist in his lyrics.

29:27

And then when I think about what Megan went through

29:30

even getting shot by another male rapper,

29:32

Tori Lanes, even

29:34

as women ascend in hip hop, the

29:37

men aren't supporting them.

29:40

Am I right to think that? And if so, what's

29:42

up with that? Why, how? You're right.

29:45

And it's very simple, they're haters. They

29:47

cannot get over the fact that these women are

29:52

having so much success, that

29:54

they are ascending on their own, that

29:56

they are touching lives in ways that they

29:59

could only imagine.

29:59

These men are, to put

30:02

it very frankly, they're boring compared

30:06

to the women. And I'm

30:08

not afraid to say it because it's a fact,

30:11

in my

30:11

opinion. It's very, very true.

30:13

So I think men

30:15

are looking at these up and

30:17

coming women artists or these more

30:19

established women artists, and they're seeing that

30:22

they're connecting

30:23

with their fans in the way that these men

30:25

could never dream

30:26

of. And they're like, well, how do I get that?

30:28

I know, I'll tear them down. And it's like,

30:31

no, no, that's not how that works. You

30:33

just look like the supreme hater that you

30:35

are. And it's like, it's

30:37

a certain kind of person who doesn't see

30:39

that. And I'll leave

30:41

it at that because it's just

30:44

a misogynoir of it all. It's just

30:46

clearest day that these

30:49

artists, these male artists don't

30:51

have a

30:54

fiber of anything that

30:57

is even equivalent to respect for women.

31:00

And that's heard in their lyrics clearly.

31:03

And it's heard in the way that they present women in their

31:05

music videos and their little documentaries

31:07

and stuff

31:07

like that. It's very clear that

31:10

they don't have an iota of respect

31:11

for women.

31:13

Hearing them and seeing them do

31:16

these kinds of tangential things when

31:18

it comes to writing lyrics

31:20

about how women ain't this, that, or the third, and then

31:23

seeing how they operate in

31:24

spaces with women or how they speak about

31:26

women when they're at their concerts. Like

31:28

Drake just had a moment, I think, recently

31:31

where he was like, oh, shout out to Meg. Oh,

31:33

not that Meg,

31:33

this Meg. He's talking about somebody

31:36

else.

31:42

And it's like, was that even necessary?

31:45

Come on, dude. Yeah, why are you taking cheap shots

31:47

as someone who is literally in the process of healing?

31:50

So, yeah, it's all

31:52

very frustrating.

31:53

Yeah. You know, what does it say about

31:56

hip hop and whether it's going to move forward

31:58

when it comes to how it treats women? that

32:01

Drake is still the biggest rapper in

32:03

the country, in the world, in spite of historically

32:06

and systemically being mean to women. He's never

32:08

stopped being kind of an asshole to women. And

32:11

yet, tour still sold out,

32:13

still got number one albums, people

32:15

still love him. What does that say about

32:17

hip-hop's fandom? That

32:19

Drake still gets to be a misogynist and win? I

32:23

think it says that we're in a stagnant

32:26

place. As much advancements

32:30

and as much as we've moved ahead

32:32

of certain things that have held us back.

32:35

In hip-hop, I do think that we're still

32:37

very, very stuck in our ways. And I

32:40

mean that in a couple of different ways. For

32:44

one,

32:44

Drake has been top man

32:47

in the industry since at least 2009.

32:50

And other people have come and gone, but he's always

32:52

kind of been in the top one to three. So I

32:55

think it's a matter of

32:57

Drake just being the option

32:59

that's always been in front of us. And

33:01

the person that has had success, we're

33:04

like, oh, well, he must be doing something right. We'll

33:06

just keep, you know, we'll keep supporting him. And

33:08

it's like, well, that's boring. And then

33:10

on the other hand, I don't know, I feel

33:12

like

33:13

it says quite a bit

33:16

that people are not willing to really

33:18

interrogate why they support

33:20

Drake, why they support his music.

33:23

I want us to really look at why we are saying

33:25

that and why we feel that

33:28

it's okay for him to be as big

33:31

and as successful as he is, even

33:33

though he is someone who has very

33:36

blatantly been an asshole to

33:38

women or been an asshole

33:40

to queer people. I love Mcconnen, who deserves

33:43

so much more. We

33:45

have all these examples littered behind

33:47

Drake as he traips us forward into

33:51

this oblivion that we have no acknowledgement

33:53

of. But yeah, it's just very,

33:56

it's a conundrum. It really

33:58

is.

33:59

Yeah, yeah. You know, I

34:02

keep thinking about how

34:04

much things have changed, but not

34:06

changed. There's this review

34:09

that Dream Hampton wrote back in 1996 of

34:13

a Nas album and

34:15

a Jay-Z album at the same time. She reviewed it,

34:17

was written, and Reasonable Doubt together.

34:21

And in 1996, she said of

34:23

the state of hip-hop that it was

34:26

philosophically stuck on, quote,

34:29

hypercapitalism, numbness,

34:32

and cartoonist misogyny. And

34:34

when I think of the most prominent male rappers

34:36

of our day in 2023, they are still doing the same thing,

34:41

even though we now have Cardi and

34:44

Megan and women in the fold. Yeah.

34:47

Knowing that, looking back on that,

34:50

are you hopeful about the next 50 years

34:52

of hip-hop? Because it feels like even

34:55

though the women have risen the prominence,

34:58

the men are still, let me

35:00

say this nicely, shitheads.

35:04

I mean, just, you know, you

35:06

pointing that out, that Dream Hampton double

35:08

review

35:08

from 1996 and

35:11

her kind

35:11

of illustration of what she heard, that

35:15

I can think of 25 artists off the

35:17

top of my head who are doing exactly that right

35:19

now. It's very much so

35:21

present. And I would

35:24

hope, you know, and that's all I can do is hope

35:26

and pray and wish that

35:28

things will start to kind

35:31

of turn a curve and start

35:33

to evolve into this new thing, this

35:36

new way of

35:37

creating and bringing life

35:39

to experiences that anybody can relate to.

35:45

Thanks again to Kiana Fitzgerald,

35:47

who happens to also be from my hometown, S

36:01

In her shoes, it's Hilted by Me,

36:03

Lindsay Peoples. Our lead producer

36:05

is Taka Zen. Our engineer is

36:07

Brandi McFarland. I'm Lindsay Peoples

36:10

and thank you so much for listening.

36:16

Support for these podcasts comes from Amazon

36:18

Prime. The wait is over. Prime

36:21

Big Deal days are here. For two days,

36:23

Amazon Prime members can get even bigger

36:25

discounts on tons of products like

36:27

clothes, electronics, furniture, toys, you

36:30

name it.

36:30

Sign up for Prime now and enjoy

36:33

the year-round perks of super-fast shipping,

36:35

exclusive entertainment and personalized

36:37

recommendations. Plus, the extra

36:39

savings of Big Deal days, only on

36:41

October 10th and 11th. Shop

36:44

now at Amazon.com

36:45

slash Prime Big Deal Days.