Hip Hop

Apologies for not posting this weekend. I celebrated my 30th B-Day (I'm aging out of this demographic, fast) and it turned into one of those weekends. Plus a guest post I had lined up fell through. Mea culpa.

Youthy-action on the information superhighway today:

• Ben Adler notes that, appearances on SNL aside, McCain is not gaining the support of young voters. - The Politico
• Jeff Johnson has an interesting - and pessimistic - critique of the black youth vote community from 2004 and how it has left black youth out in the cold during this election cycle. - Black Politics on the Web
• On a related topic, Campus Progress has an interview with Keli Goff about her new book: Party Crashing: How the Hip Hop Generation Declared Political Independence. Keli has similar views to Jeff about the allegiances of young black voters. - Campus Progress
• Kay Steiger at Campus Progress also reviewed feminist-blogger Amanda Marcotte's new book this week. - Campus Progress
• The GAO is going to start monitoring more closely the government's management of student loan programs. - The Politico
• Here's a very interesting blog post about replicating the success of local activism/institutions in other areas. Brush up on your Alinsky. - Open Left

• Will Ralph Nader poach youth votes from the Democrats this year? - Chronicle of Higher Education
• Will John McCain poach youth votes from the Democrats this year? - The Politico
• Kat Barr from Rock the Vote interviews me and reviews Youth to Power. - WireTap
• Tim Fernholz has a tough but fair review of Youth to Power. - Campus Progress
• 17 year old Pennsylvanians are fighting for the right to cast primary ballots if they will be 18 by election day. - Fair Vote
• Obama hits McCain for failing to support the Webb GI Bill. - TPM Election Central
• Bob Herbert gets hip to the economic plight of Millennials - New York Times
• Former candidate George McGovern has an interesting solution to bring the primaries to an amicable end. - New York Times
• Along a number of indicators, the civic engagement gap between college and non-college youth has widened since the 1970s. - Peter Levine
• Hip Hop youth organizing is going local and deeper in 2008. - Boston Globe

• Can Youth Swing Pennsylvania?
• Young Voters Help Start Political Phenomenon
• Marvin Krislov, the President of Oberlin College, talks about barriers that young people - particularly college students - face in voting, and how a simple action on the part of universities can help lower those barriers: Laying the Foundation for Voting
• Keli Goff appeared on Fire Dog Lake's book salon today to talk about her new book: Party Crashing: How the Hip Hop Generation Declared Political Independence. It's next on my book list.

This is the keynote from Black Youth Vote's SpeakOut event at South Carolina State University earlier this month:

I think Johnson sets up a false dichotomy between online and offline activism, but his points about Citizen Change/Vote or Die! not creating a real movement around electoral politics rings true to me. And I've heard his comments about the cooption of the civil rights generation by the political establishment echoed in a lot of articles about Hip Hop Activism.

Very interesting. I'm trying to talk to some folks at the Hip Hop Caucus so I can dig in a little deeper on what groups like the Hip Hop Summit Action Network and others actually accomplish. I'll be writing more about this in the near future.

Update: Here's a condensed, 10 minute video of one of the panels at today's hearing. You should watch it.

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I had no idea that this was going down, but both Davey D and The Seminal are reporting on congressional hearings on racism and misogyny in rap lyrics which occurred yesterday. The hearing took the form of three panels featuring a mix of record industry and entertainment executives, artists, and academics. Both DaveyD and The Seminal listened to the hearings almost in their entirety (something I've yet to do), so I'll make a few quick points and then refer you to their coverage.

1. It amazed me that even in this setting, the record industry executives tried to pawn this off on file-sharing and piracy. WTF? Props to Anthony Weiner for keeping them on track. It makes me somewhat more comfortable that he's probably the front runner to replace Bloomberg as Mayor of NYC.
2. Let's not forget our history here. I don't know who called this hearing, but I'm assuming it was a Democrat since we control the House. Democrats have a long history of pillorying the music industry for what they perceive to be their own electoral gain. They did it in the 80s, with the Parents Music Resource Center, which was headed by then Senator Al Gore's wife, Tipper and which instigated hearings into music ratings; Joe Lieberman has railed against the entertainment industry in general for decades; Clinton betrayed the music community over a manufactured controversy, and Hillary Clinton hates video games.
   

   All the while, Republicans have taken a much more libertarian view to the issue (evangelical christian groups aside). You could argue that The Wedding Crashers is a movie that in part degrades women (or men . . . ), yet that didn't stop John McCain from making a guest appearance. When 2 Live Crew got in trouble for obscenities at their events, it was Republicans who cited the first Amendment while Democrats excoriated the performers.

   All of this is in spite of the fact that violence among teens, teen pregnancy - all the indicators that entertainment is having a negative impact - are down.

   There is no causation between video games, music lyrics or violent movies and teen behavior. All of this hemming and hawing has done nothing but alienate cultural allies of the Democratic Party and the progressive movement without picking up one more vote for Democrats or addressing the real issues at stake when we talk about racism and misogyny in entertainment.

I think the folks at The Seminal summed it up best in their piece:

Instead, we need to be focused on root causes, as Dyson and others pointed out. It was good to see the discussion in the hearing return time and time again to basic issues of racism and sexism. This isn’t about the music industry. This isn’t about parental controls or censorship or moral degradation. If you have a problem with sex and violence in culture, then you need to examine that culture a little more critically. The degradation of black women and the violence against and between black men existed long before hip hop was invented and will likely exist long afterwards. Solving the hip hop “problem” will not actually solve anything.

If you really want to solve this “problem,” if it really is a problem to be solved, then you need to start digging deeper. Addressing issues like poverty, opportunity, and the drug war are a good start. If you eliminate the roots of violence, sexism, and racism in society, then violent, racist, or sexist cultural products can be taken for exactly what they are: Entertainment, nothing more, nothing less.

You can listen to testimony here. Thanks to DaveyD for the Odeo links:

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• Embedding is disabled, but Obama is getting a shout-out from Common in his latest video. Watch it on YouTube, or read about it at the Students for Barack Obama Blog. It's not Mosh - it's more a cameo than a call to action - but it's pretty cool. And hey, it's Common. If you haven't seen it lately, Obama's been getting more love recently from the Hip Hop community. Since he graced this month's cover of Vibe (and sat for a Q&A), the traditional media is also starting to notice.
• Brave New Films has a scary new piece illustrating the similarities between the run up to the Iraq War and the current debate on Iran that is happening in the media:
  
• Speaking of the war, here's a video of Iraq Veterans Against the War speaking out at Yearly Kos:
  
• On this issue of the troops vs. the pundits, check out this piece by Paul Reickhoff of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America over at Huffington Post (hat tip to Blue Heretic).
• DNC Chair Howard Dean continues to give big props to young people as the future of the party. Apparently his remarks at Yearly Kos are becoming something of a stump speech. Now all he has to do is convince the neolithic state parties to undo the purse strings and offer their young constituents a well-resourced place at the table.
• Finally, I don't normally shill products (and I'm not getting paid for this), but this seems like a handy tool for bloggers and activists alike. And ePolitics runs down some potential uses.