It’s time for a #MeToo moment in hip hop

Within the weeks following the horrific revelations made in Lifetime’s bombshell six-part docuseries “Surviving R. Kelly,” the fallout has been immense. The 52-year-old R&B celebrity, accused of alleged sexual and bodily abuse with underage ladies spanning almost three a long time, has parted methods with Sony Music Leisure and its subsidiary RCA Data, following protests over his conduct. However whereas a day of reckoning appears to be lastly at hand for Kelly, the hip-hop and R&B world has but to actually have the #MeToo moment that has rocked Hollywood, skilled sports activities, the video-game trade and the journalism biz. Rapper Kodak Black is awaiting trial this April for allegedly pinning down, biting and raping a girl in a South Carolina resort. However regardless of such severe allegations, the tattooed 21-year-old “Tunnel Imaginative and prescient” hit-maker continues to be handled like an A-lister. Kodak has been a frequent VIP visitor of school soccer’s Florida Gators and the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens and continues to be working with a number of the greatest artists in the music trade, together with Migos’ Offset and “Sicko Mode” headliner Travis Scott (“ZEZE”), pop celebrity Bruno Mars (“Wake Up in The Sky”) and platinum rapper and criminal-justice activist Meek Mill (“Tic Tac Toe”). Veteran music govt Antonio “L.A.” Reid was ousted from his CEO submit at Epic Data in Could 2017 amid a number of allegations of sexual misconduct. However such alleged abhorrent habits hasn’t stopped the disgraced visionary behind the likes of Usher, TLC and Pink from being re-embraced by the recording trade. Reid has raised over $100 million for his newest label enterprise Hitco Leisure. His first excessive profile signing was Large Boi of Outkast, the long-lasting hip-hop group Reid initially found in the early ’90s. Hip-hop royalty Nas, whose ex-wife and singer Kelis has accused the profitable tech-venture capitalist of psychological and bodily abuse throughout their five-year marriage, has skilled little fallout from the disturbing revelations. The Queens emcee’s 2018 launch “Nasir,” produced by Kanye West, was his 12th top-10 album on Billboard. After which there’s controversial rapper XXXTentacion, who was shot useless final June. He had been publicly praised by Mill, West and Erykah Badu and was posthumously featured on the soundtrack to the Oscar-nominated, animated hit movie “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” — regardless of being charged with aggravated battery of a pregnant girl, home battery by strangulation and false imprisonment. One nameless feminine editor remembers a 2011 picture shoot throughout her time at hip-hop journal XXL the place she pushed again towards the sexual advances of a sure platinum rap celebrity signed to Dangerous Boy Data. “As I appeared down at my notes throughout [the interview] and commenced making ready my recorder, he went in for a kiss,” says the veteran music journalist, who nonetheless refuses to call names for worry of being shunned by the rap trade. “I ended up pushing him off. A couple of days later, I came upon mentioned rapper and his supervisor had been badmouthing me post-incident, saying they thought I used to be some younger, simple thot that wished it.” So why the slow-walk to carry the hip-hop trade accountable? “There’s simply sure issues in our tradition that we simply don’t discuss,” says Jackie O Asare, a veteran music publicist who has represented such acts as Lil Jon, Three 6 Mafia and Mya. “Hip-hop tells us to man up, cope with it and preserve it transferring.” There are different causes, after all. Hip-hop, which has surpassed rock as the preferred music style in the US, continues to be fueled by largely road, male-dominated vitality and has struggled to shake off a few of its misogynistic previous. However probably the most telling purpose R. Kelly and others have been capable of function with impunity for years is as a result of most of their victims have been ladies of coloration — extra particularly black ladies. The hip-hop and R&B world has but to actually have the #MeToo moment that has rocked Hollywood {and professional} sports activities. White ladies who’ve come ahead towards highly effective trade titans equivalent to Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein (presently dealing with 5 counts of rape and sexual assault) and ousted chairman and CEO of CBS Les Moonves have largely been painted as courageous, credible witnesses. The black and brown victims of Kelly and different city music figures are sometimes instances dismissed as gold diggers who ought to have identified higher. It’s a sobering actuality that Likelihood the Rapper admitted in “Surviving R. Kelly” when he apologized for working with him. “Black ladies are exponentially a greater oppressed and violated group of individuals, like simply in comparability with the entire world,” Likelihood mentioned, including: “I didn’t worth the accusers’ tales as a result of they had been black ladies . . . I made a mistake.” It goes even deeper than that. For years, African-Individuals have felt the necessity to defend black males towards outdoors assaults provided that we now have typically instances been traditionally portrayed in a detrimental gentle by the lens of the media. It’s a pure reflex for many black folks. Even Golden Globe-winning TV and movie actress Taraji P. Henson initially defended R. Kelly on social media, implying that extra folks had been making an attempt to silence him than Weinstein, insinuating racial bias, earlier than strolling again her claims. “LET ME BE CLEAR,” Henson later clarified on Twitter, “KELLY IS GUILTY AND WRONG AND SHOULD BE MUTED PERIOD!!!!!” As Likelihood The Rapper, Henson and others proceed to show, the #MeToo moment for R&B and hip-hop — and the general black group — is a lengthy, advanced and painful journey. And it begins at residence. Keith Murphy is a veteran Chicago-born journalist and editor who has written for VIBE, Esquire, OZY, ESPN’s The Undefeated and BET Share this: https://nypost.com/2019/01/26/why-hip-hop-needs-its-own-metoo-moment/ The post It’s time for a #MeToo moment in hip hop appeared first on My style by Kartia.