Complaining about rap's influence on the NBA = racism?

I've heard it several times now, first someone will complain about the NBA being "too thugged out" or "too hip hop" now and then some pundit or radio host or whoever will say that it's subtle racism, that hip hop is code word for black. I've never bought that argument myself as I am someone who thinks that the NBA is too "hip hop" (for lack of a better word). Charles Barkley called hip hop a code word for "too black" and said it was subtle racism, but he was hardly the only one.

But what about when it's black people saying the NBA is too hip hop? Spike Lee is quoted in the current issue of ESPN the Magazine saying that he doesn't like the rapper's association with the NBA ( he bring's up Nelly and his 'pimp juice' - Spike Lee has also been a critic of Snoop Dogg's lyrics). Scottie Pippen said the NBA is more hip hop than when he played and that he didn't understand alot of the younger guys. Many other black basketball fans and older players have complained about it as well.

So is it racism or is it a legit complaint?



*I use the term 'hip hop' how the mainsteam uses it, i understand and appreciate the difference between real hip hop (mos def, krs one) and rap (nelly, 50 cent) and I know that even alot of the 'real hip hop' artists aren't fans of the thugged out and bling bling style rappers. Since KRS One complains about the lyrical content of many of the rappers today, how does that factor into this?

It is racism, kinda, but it's not. There's race, yes. But there's also generational gap too.

Most of it has to do with the disconnect between the players (generally young, black, grew up poor) and the owners, skybox renters, advertisers and politicians who finance the sport (generally white, older, rich).

The rich, old, white men don't understand why the players wear braids and big chains, walk around with their posses, etc so they look for an easy explanation - it must be all that hip hop on MTV. And since sports columnists don't understand it too, they also think, "Oh, it must be hip hop." And since hip hop is such an alien culture to most people over a certain age, black or white, it's easy to see why it becomes a "bad thing".

Now, if most of the players were white and had moppy hair or wore studded wristbands, would they be talking about music's influence on NBA? Of course not. The it's something the older, rich white men who finance and write about the sport are more familiar with.

I think the real issue here is that people are missing the point. There isn't so much an influence as there is an intersection. An NBA player doesn't have a posse because 50 Cent has one. It's because they need a support system that their biological family couldn't provide (white players have posses to of course - they're just called "housemates" or at worst, "entourage"). The chains they wear, well, it's partly influenced by hip hop, but not in the way the talking heads think - they share a set of sensibilities with rappers, because like rappers, they come into wealth after having very little, and in the culture they share, wealth is flaunted. They're not influenced by hip hop (or to be more accurate, black urban youth culture) - they are in it.

So yeah, it's racism in the sense that it's the fear of the unfamiliar. And if hip hop wasn't such a "black" culture, would they be bothered by it? Probably not as much - you don't hear complaints about Steve Nash's hair or Kirk Heinrich's shorts.

What about black people who complain about it? Well, the two people mention, Spike Lee and Scottie Pippen, both didn't grow up with hip hop all their lives. Most of the players now, who were born in the late 70s to the early 80s, they've known hip hop all their lives, so it's not at all foreign. Spike has watched hip hop's growth and like many people his age, he disapproves of the shallow commercialism and pines for the good old days.

When Pippen says players are "more hip hop than ever", I guess he's talking about the me-first attitude and some of the off court troubles. That has more to do with players who have had shoe companies licking their feet since they were 14 and not being ready for the fame and wealth. Again, there are common traits with hip hop, but there's no causation.

There's a great essay by Robin Kelley in Yo Mama's Dysfunktional that talks about the intersection of pick-up ball, hip hop, graffiti, etc., as products of a particular moment in the history of cities when opportunities for working-class jobs closed down and large numbers of African Americans began looking for other ways to get paid. All the above provide access to extreme wealth for a small, but highly visible percentage of urban youth, and the style of each kind of cross pollinated.

I think the essay is called "Looking to Get Paid" IIRC.

Nope, there are lots of complaints about Steve Nash's hair

Good point on the intersection of age and basketball. I'd just chime in that the intersection may be the one between the attractiveness of the game and the personal attractiveness of the players. To this middle-aged middle-class white guy, today's professional ballplayers, esp in b-ball, just look like buffoons. The clothes, the music, the accoutrements looks ridiculous: everyone's visually trying to grab your attention by being ever-more outrageous. The game's kind of the same way. Hoops these days seems to be as much 1 on 3 as a team game anymore. You know the drill, team's best ballplayer gets the ball on the wing, everyone else clears out and he literally picks up the ball and runs to the hoop, gettting beat up along the way and tosses the ball up in a prayer, hoping it'll go in for a three-pointer. Or you have the two-man version: some guard tries to penetrate, the defense collapses, said guard kicks it out to some guy stationed on the wing (read that stationary and immobile) and he throws up a three.

Basketball is just not a pretty game to watch anymore. Oh, it is athletic and these guys do play hard, but it is work to watch a game. These things move in cycles, and usually the cycles are explainable, and this is just one attempt to explain this cycle.

In my opinion your argument has two major flaws.

1) you are stereotyping the people who you allege are doing the stereotyping. How do you know why someone with white skin doesn't like rap culture? I am white, I grew up on LL Cool J (first two albums only), Stetsasonic, Whodini, Grandmaster Flash, Doug E Fresh (all the way to heaven) and I still like alot of it. But I, like many people white, black, female, male, young and old think talking about killing people, calling women bitches, bragging about out of wedlock children and calling yourself a thug is disgusting. Why isn't that enough of a reason to dislike the culture of thug/bling bling?

I think people try to do too much philophisizing
(sp?) when it comes to not liking the music.



2) Your argument about white players seems off the mark to me. If the league was mostly white and the players all were into the same type of music and had moppy haircuts and listened to death metal and it showed in their persona's then yes, people would have a problem with it. You really think if Steve Nash had a skull tatoo and Raef Lafrentz flashed satanic signs it wouldn't be a problem?

To the same point, many people wouldn't have a problem with the NBA and rap's image if it was Will Smith, LL Cool J and Skee Lo that was being marketed.


I don't think it's a coincidence that people have a problem with rap music and that's the same music promoting all sorts of bad things.



That is what Spike Lee is talking about. Spike Lee once said that the most negative images he sees of black people is on B.E.T. Can anyone really dispute that?

I did no such thing. In fact, my main point was that the disconnect was probably more generational than racial. I grew up with hip hop but for people who talk about, own, and finance basketball, it's generally not part of who they are. Now you have people in their 40s who were there for hip hop's early years, but for the most part, it's a foreign culture to the movers and shakers of basketball.

The generation gap is the biggest factor, but the fact that hip hop is a predominantly black culture adds to the unfamiliarity and consequently, fear.

I'm not sure how this is a response to my post.

The skull tattoo? Probably not. Scott Pollard is merely "quirky", possibly "weird" but . Satanic signs? Sure, and I would expect fans to be similarly outraged if white players did the throat slitting gesture that was popular a few years back.

But we're talking about people getting upset over cornrows and clothing. Yes, they're associated with the worst of hip hop culture, but cornrows never killed anyone and neither have big chains (although they are supporting de facto slavery by buying diamond, but that's a topic for a different forum).

If Maroon 5 had recorded "Dirt Off Your Shoulder" and Brad Miller started brushing his shoulder after dunks, we wouldn't be talking about the ill effects of VH1 on basketball and society.

I think you completely missed the point about distinguishing correlation from causation.

I suppose one could make a serious case for the 11 o'clock news or daytime talk shows.

But maroon 5 doesn't talk about bitches and guns. If Brad Miller started banging his head like Vince Neil then we would be talking about the ill effects of metal on basketball and society, provided people still listened to metal.


As for you not genralizing well you did say

"it is racism, kinda" so that's where I got it.


Also as far as cornrows, like you even admitted it is associated with the bad element of gangsta rap, though people don't really complain about corn rows anymore, they did when they first came popular but even Michael Jordan and Tim Hardaway complained about them, so it isn't racial.

And the whole not wearing a belt and having your pants hang down never killed anyone either, but it is influenced by prison. I think you're the one missing the point on causation.

How can there be a generation gap when we have Bill Walton yelling, "FACE!", every so often each telecast?

Truth told, cornrows have been around in lesser numbers for decades- even before Bo Derek made them popular in "10" way back when. I won't address whether they've been co-opted by a different mindset these days, but they're nothing new. I see tons of perfectly decent kids wearing them.

If in fact basketball has changed as much as some people say (I'm not a student of the game, so I won't opine on whether that's true), that may well be due to whatever changes there have been in the urban environment. My guess is that neither rap nor hairstyles are responsible for any change in the game, but that the increasing hopelessness -or perception thereof- of the whole urban situation (where basketball reigns over all other sports) is responsible for changes in both rap and b-ball.

If the guys with the cornrows and entourages boxed out better, showed up on time to practice, could make a mid-range jumper, accepted the coach's authority, played hard and smart every minute, and were gracious in victory and defeat, nobody would give a fvck about the hair.

It's the intersection between the hip-hop attitudes about respect and humility, and the NBA, that's where the problem arises.

Cornrows have been around for decades in Africa. Maybe centuries, but I've seen them on PBS. Yes and I agree, decent people have corn rows.

I don't know. There are more and more black icons coming out against the music now, even freaking Al Sharpton condemned it a couple of weeks ago. Spike Lee. Even some black politicians.



And my above posts are a bit disjointed. Let me sum it up this way: Because someone opposes the violent and sexist nature of rap music and it's inclusion in the NBA lifestyle, doesn't make them a racist.

It doesn't mean there is a generation gap either.

It most cases it just means they don't like the violence and sexism.


I think people are really trying to find some sort of psychology or behavioral pattern to why people are so opposed to rap music. Maybe it's as simple as not liking the violence and sexism.

As a matter of fact, I saw an African American woman, about 22 years old on CNN last week leading an effort to get sexism out of rap music. Anyone else see this? She speaks at public events - she says that rap music has degraded African American females. I find it hard to argue that Nelly, Ludacris and others are putting out the worst possible depictions of black women out there.


Anyway I want the violent rap out of culture altogether. Not because I am older and grew up with 'old school'. Nor am I a racist. I just want this disgusting style of music out of our culture.

You can be rebelious about the 'urban situation' without talking about killing other people in the same situation. KRS One and Public Enemy talked about these things, they were rebelious, but they weren't thugs, pimps, playas, etc.



One last thing.....I don't necassarily think the game has changed that much either.....and the changes that have been made are also influenced by Pat Riley, an old white guy. He forced the Knicks to play slow down ball/defense because his team lacked talent....when other coaches saw that this style worked they mimicked it and the fast break almost became extinct.

Flava Flav would slap you if you said he wasn't a playa. Let's not give that man too much credit, but Chuck is cool.