"Tricks" vs. "Sistas"
Ok so I thought I go with rap because there are so little examples of positive portrayals of women and soooo many examples of negative ones. So here’s an all too common example of extremely negative portrayal of women as “hoes” and ”tricks” and “sluts.” Here’s a gem from Dr. Dre with the wonderfully titled, “Bitches Ain’t Shit” :
Bitches ain't shit but hoes and tricks
Lick on deez nutz and suck the dick
Get's the f**k out after you're done
And I hops in my ride to make a quick run...
...To the store, to get me a 4-0
Snoop Doggy Dogg paged, that must mean more hoes
So I head down the street to long beach
Just so i could meet, a freak
To lick me from my head to my feet
And I'm here, now I'm ready to be done up
Nothin' but homies around so I puts my gun up
Bitches on my nuts like clothes
But i'm from the pound and we don't love them hoes
How could you trust a hoe? Why?
'cause a hoe's a trick
We don't love them tricks Why?
'cause a trick's a bitch
And my dick's constantly in her mouth
And turnin' them trick ass hoes the f**k out
I only included about half the song because it only gets painfully worse as it goes on. Not only degrading, just plain bad.
Now, here’s Tupac with a rare song from that era of rap—good lyrics, positive message, positive view of women—all around good song, entitled “Keep Your Head Up” :
Some say the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice
I say the darker the flesh then the deeper the roots
I give a holler to my sisters on welfare
Tupac cares, if don't nobody else care
And uhh, I know they like to beat ya down a lot
When you come around the block brothas clown a lot
But please don't cry, dry your eyes, never let up
Forgive but don't forget, girl keep your head up
And when he tells you you ain't nuttin don't believe him
And if he can't learn to love you you should leave him
Cause sista you don't need him
And I ain't tryin to gas ya up, I just call em how I see em
You know it makes me unhappy (what's that)
When brothas make babies, and leave a young mother to be a pappy
And since we all came from a woman
Got our name from a woman and our game from a woman
I wonder why we take from our women
Why we rape our women, do we hate our women?
I think it's time to kill for our women
Time to heal our women, be real to our women
And if we don't we'll have a race of babies
That will hate the ladies, that make the babies
And since a man can't make one
He has no right to tell a woman when and where to create one
So will the real men get up
I know you're fed up ladies, but keep your head up
Keep ya head up, oooo child things are gonna get easier
ooooo child things are gonna get brighter [2x]
Unbeknownst to me when I picked these two songs, they were actually made in the same year—1993. I am in no way a hip hop connoisseur, nor was I even a functioning adult when these songs came out, but from my limited experience with hip hop, I am going to surmise that, unfortunately, the style shown by the Dr. Dre song was much more prevalent at the time than the uplifting words from Tupac. I would say that even for Tupac, this song is a bit of an exception. His raps were never as degrading as Dre’s, but not always as respectful towards women as this song is. Both songs are rapped by African-American men who were about the same age, and both who were famous rappers at the time of release. The fact that both artists are men has everything to do with the words they say. Tupac is trying to bring women up, speaking about them as different from himself, and thus in need of assistance, whereas Dre is degrading women and their insignificant role in his life. Musicians and rappers have a huge opportunity to positively impact the millions that listen to their music. Tupac is using his fame well in this song (kudos) and Dre is failing horribly (yuck.)