California Feminist Blogs

I've always been acutely aware of certain "isms" that plague our society and more generally aware that there are isms that affect others much more tragically or more constantly. These isms divide the people and keep us from working together to make this world a better place. These isms cause us to mistrust one another and even work against each other. These isms kill people, devastate communities and cause wars that never seem to end.

While Hip Hop may seem to innately tackle the ism of race and even class, Hip Hop has in many ways mimicked it's oppressor and perpetuated many other isms that exist to degrade humanity. And perhaps we could even say that Hip Hop is not merely mimicking the dominant hegemony but simply at this stage of the game, just being itself. It's not as though the other cultures from which Hip Hop sprang were highly progressive when it came to sexual orientation or gender relations.

We are all guilty of prejudice. Whether it's based on facts or stereotypes, we form opinions about people before we have even engaged them in meaningful or extended interaction. It's normal. We certainly shouldn't be afraid to talk about it. It's only hateful when we allow what we do not understand to become bigoted ignorance.

Many gay rights activists in California this November pointed the finger at communities of color with praise for electing Obama and with disappointment believing their vote took away the gay community's right to marry. They have rightfully said, in their plea to this conservative faction of people of color, that MLK Jr. was not offended by homosexuality and in fact had at least one key advisor who was such.

Given the history that informed Hip Hop at the foundation of its creation, I can see why we are still quite archaic when it comes to gender relations and sexual identity, whether that be within the revolution, at the video shoot, in the studio, in the academy or in our homes. When American citizens stepped up their level of humanity to show the world that we would not let prejudice and ignorance, the trajectory we were trapped onto by the Bush administration, be the course that we stay on, it spoke volumes to the social psychology of our nation.

I am elated by the contribution that Hip Hop, a worldview that seeks to look past race and class and expose why these isms were created in the first place, had on this evolved American social psychology. However, I am concerned that while we celebrate our victory, we will forget that other isms still exist to crumble our progress. Isms and phobias that deny rights to good, hard working people, who are apart of Hip Hop and our struggle as a whole; isms that still, in 2008! have me earning 75% of my male counter-part and being taken less seriously in the struggle because of my gender.

Therefore, I plan to grab the bull by it's nasty isms (versus riding the coatails of change) and tackle these issues of gender relations and homophobia within our community.

Hip Hop. It don't stop.

Oh, Mr. Nader, in your bittersweet resentment of Barack Obama you have allowed your envy to dictate your action and called our first Black President-elect an "Uncle Tom", and allowed the enemy to call the kettle black.

I can understand that as a revolutionary you may simply see just another Democrat taking the throne of an American presidency. You may think that he is an establishment leader and thus the change he brings is nothing more than temporary reform.

You have chosen to focus on the tree instead of the forest so that you can continue to promote your own political agenda.

When southern Blacks forced integration, they did not build black-only diners and then open them up to the whites. They walked into already established whites-only restaurants and took a place at the table. The only way to revolutionize the establishment was to become a part of it and then redefine it with new institutions both tangible and abstract. And even when they played by the constitutional rules, they were still killed, beaten and broken down.

You Mr. Nader may believe that your revolutionary stance and inclusive policy proposals allow you the right to critique this new Black president and his so-called "change" platform in the manner that you did. But you certainly never called any other president an "Uncle Tom." And quite frankly you sounded like the white boy who got invited to the house party and thought he was cool enough now to use the "N" word.

And like the white boy at the house party, you were sorely mistaken.

Your points were relevant when you questioned Obama's economic policies and voting record. However, when you decided to use a racial epitaph to describe the type of man Obama might be should he not hold the corporate elite accountable, your ideas got lost in translation and you became a "racist."

You gave fodder to FOXNews, a white supremacist news network, to use against our movement and highlight a division that may or may not truly exist. Honestly, you are from an older generation that sees race in terms quite differently then my own generation. My generation, my people, Hip Hop culture, gave rise to this Black president because we understand that you must free your mind first and the rest will follow.

Mr. Nader, come join our revolution. Let your fear go. Your time has passed. You need to embrace the future.