On the cold Winter Wednesday, I found myself, as I do many days, scrolling through Instagram stories searching for some cheap dopamine. This day however my efforts would be rewarded; it was Spotify wrapped day (a judgmental person’s Christmas). Gathering my data to judge society and make broad claims about society based on the tiny sample size the people I follow on Instagram, the most curious trend appeared. It seemed that, despite ‘losing’ the most epic rap beef of the 21st century, Drake was still in many people’s top 5 streamed artists for the year. For some, he was in fact their first.

 

How could the man who’s entire character was defamed in the public sphere still find himself on top statistically speaking? To me it was no surprise. Not because some of Kendrick’s points were markedly hypocritical; not because Drake isn’t a predator or anything; not because pgLang’s marketing department is legendary, but because Drake was a scapegoat for the sorry state Hip-Hop and its reflection of the Black community. Not to say the Black community is ‘sorry,’ but more so directed at the fact that the accusations Kendrick made about Drake were mostly known in the broader Hip-Hop community. Only once Kendrick dropped the song of the year in “Not Like Us” did people seem to care about Drake being a predator and a fraud. And, in the end, many did not seem to care about Drake’s character based on Spotify wrapped results.

 

In the intro track to Mos Def’s legendary album Black on Both Sides he speaks on how we can understand what’s happening in Hip-hop:

 

I tell em, "You know what's gonna happen with hip-hop?

Whatever's happening with us"

If we smoked out, hip-hop is gonna be smoked out

If we doin' alright, hip-hop is gonna be doin' alright

People talk about hip-hop like it's some giant livin' in the hillside

 

Using these words as the criteria to judge Hip-Hop and the people within it, outing Drake for all of the terrible things he’s done is reasonable but not critical enough of the conditions that allowed someone like Drake to exist within the Black community. Drake is not an Elvis, he is not a giant on the hillside; he is an integral part of the Hip-hop community and has been for over a decade. He is deeply entrenched within the space and has a co-sign from one of the greatest American-born Black rappers ever. He is not someone who could be considered an outsider in any sense of the word. That being the case, why was it posited that he was an outsider? Outside of Kendrick’s obvious personal hatred towards Drake, it made for a good, convenient story that was easily marketable for the masses. It was a dialectical arc where good finally conquered evil and all was right in the world.

 

This is not an interrogation of Kendrick nor Drake (we shouldn’t give much credence to celebrities anyways), but it is a challenge of the idea that Hip-hop can move to a new era by blaming one man for all its problems. If that were the case, we’d talk about Kendrick bringing up Dr Dre, a man who loves to beat women, onto stage while simultaneously dissing a predator. No, it isn’t enough to blame one person as our culture is the sum of the masses. If we hate Drake so much, don’t allow him to exist by removing the material conditions that permit him to thrive and be successful. Stepping away from idolatry that allows egomaniacs to thrive is a tangible first step in divesting from a system that seeks to exploit Black communities.

 

 

 

Who you follow, who you leading? Trust me

It's gon' show who you believe in

 

Mick Jenkins