Reflective Essay On Hip Hop

My love and appreciation for Hip Hop/ Rap has been a pretty recent attraction. It was something I grew up around, but wasn’t interested in. Most of the people that listened to rap in high school were the more popular kids, so I didn’t think there would be anything I could relate to and stayed away. All I consumed was the stuff on the radio. College changed my rap consumption though. When I was on campus, I found that I was having more and more free time, so I wanted to try out this thing so many from my past loves so much. When I finally starting to listen to rap, it opened up a whole new culture that I never knew about. There were so many ways different components in each verse, and so many different styles or “flows” for the way people speak. …show more content…
They include the utilitarian, the rights approach, the fairness approach, the common good approach, and the virtue approach. Out of these five, I believe the rights approach fits best within my ethical dilemma. The Markkula Center for Applied Ethics defines a right as a “justified claim onto others” and says the “justification of a claim is dependent on some standard acknowledges and accepted not just by the claimant, but also by society in general”. This article goes on to talk about moral rights and negative rights. Within a moral right, someone has the justification over a belief that it not always backed by the law, but with negative rights, each person has the right of freedom and liberty to do and be whatever that seems fit under the …show more content…
And I think the only way to see change in the way women are depicted is to challenge Hip Hop. Asking questions and putting pressure on the artists to create content that doesn’t depict a woman’s body. Seeing why records labels are more likely to sign a man as a Hip Hop artist than introducing a female, and if a female is signed, why must she have to undergo this sexualizing process to sell records. Besides just challenging the industry as a whole, taking personal accountability and changing some of the music/ artist you consume. Starting to eliminate people that seem to have only one type of message of woman, not matter how hot the beat is. Looking for artist that can express their opinions about women without using the word “bitch” or “hoe” for every other word. And seeking artist that have content which looks at social issues like the overall misogyny. Finally, to correct this ethical dilemma, purchasing and consuming music by other women. Female rappers have an understanding about how a female Hip Hop fan works, and what they like to consume. By listening closer to their voices and seeing what they have to say, we can create change in this industry and the overall aspect of gender