(no subject)
May. 10th, 2006 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
badstarHoisted from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
slightlymadman
If you don't like rap, are you a racist?
Stephin Merritt is an unlikely cracker. The creative force behind the Magnetic Fields, Merritt is diminutive, gay, and painfully intellectual. His music is witty and tender. He plays the ukulele. He named his Chihuahua after Irving Berlin. And yet no less an influential music critic than The New Yorker's Sasha Frere-Jones has used that word—"cracker"—to describe him. Frere-Jones has also called him "Stephin 'Southern Strategy' Merritt," presumably in reference to Richard Nixon's race-baiting attempt to crush the Democratic Party. These are heady words, part of a two-year online campaign of sorts by Frere-Jones (also a former Slate music critic) and the Chicago Reader music contributor Jessica Hopper to brand Merritt a racist. The charge: He doesn't like hip-hop, and on those occasions when he's publicly discussed his personal music tastes, he has criticized black artists.
Honestly, I've never heard of the guy, but to call someone racist based on their musical preferences...and note that the guy has also criticized white pop artists...is insane.
It's like someone saying that I'm prejudiced against the Japanese because J-pop makes my brain hurt. (I'll amend that to say "all of the J-pop that I've heard" makes my brain hurt.)
In other news, only related because it's about music... Archive is releasing a new album this month!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *squeaks*
slightlymadmanIf you don't like rap, are you a racist?
Stephin Merritt is an unlikely cracker. The creative force behind the Magnetic Fields, Merritt is diminutive, gay, and painfully intellectual. His music is witty and tender. He plays the ukulele. He named his Chihuahua after Irving Berlin. And yet no less an influential music critic than The New Yorker's Sasha Frere-Jones has used that word—"cracker"—to describe him. Frere-Jones has also called him "Stephin 'Southern Strategy' Merritt," presumably in reference to Richard Nixon's race-baiting attempt to crush the Democratic Party. These are heady words, part of a two-year online campaign of sorts by Frere-Jones (also a former Slate music critic) and the Chicago Reader music contributor Jessica Hopper to brand Merritt a racist. The charge: He doesn't like hip-hop, and on those occasions when he's publicly discussed his personal music tastes, he has criticized black artists.
Honestly, I've never heard of the guy, but to call someone racist based on their musical preferences...and note that the guy has also criticized white pop artists...is insane.
It's like someone saying that I'm prejudiced against the Japanese because J-pop makes my brain hurt. (I'll amend that to say "all of the J-pop that I've heard" makes my brain hurt.)
In other news, only related because it's about music... Archive is releasing a new album this month!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *squeaks*
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 10:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 11:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 01:33 am (UTC)But the kicker is, just because someone *likes* rap doesn't mean they *aren't* racist.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 01:44 am (UTC)depends on why you say it's not music. If you're saying it's not music because of the color of the skin f the people that are most prominent in the genre that's one thing. But then you could just be a musical snob.
Personally, I have a hard time justifying the application ot the label "music" to certain things, including some of the seriously hard-core rap...but that's not because of who um...produces it (can't really say "sings" for rap). It's because it doesn't even remotely resemble music to me. But that's a subjective opinion, and if the dictionary definition applies, so be it.
but yes, rap and racism are not mutually exclusive, though I think it's reasonable to say that one who is racist is more likely to dislike than like rap. At least, one who is racist towards black people.