When I Die, I Want My Biography To Be Done By White People Too

I still find it amazing to believe that, in the year 2010, the dark butts of the world still feel a ways about white people who listen to hip hop, as if it’s taboo for them to do so in the first place. I’m not in the business of shouting out my slave masters for allowing me to cop all this ice and Nikes, but at this point white people will support the “real hip hop” more than the bullheaded elitist schmucks who will complain there’s not enough of. Don’t believe me? The person who put on The Sugar Hill Gang was a White woman. The top major labels have a non-Black person at its helm (the only one? Def Jam. And look at that stunt they pulled a few weeks ago). Go to a Sean Price concert, or attend any of this year’s upcoming Rock The Bells festivals. I won’t even begin to delve into dancehall and reggae. Sure, the rest of us will hit a Jay Electronica concert every now and then, but that’s only if Puffy will pop up on stage to adlib alongside him.

So what exactly is the big deal that the film chronicling the life and times of N.W.A. is going to be written by a White woman? The film isn’t necessarily going an epic tale of inner turmoil and struggle between one of the most influential groups in hip hop’s storied history; it’s just gonna be a bunch of dudes bickering over money until one of them drops dead from AIDS, one starts scoring porno films with Ron Jeremy, one starts doing doofy sitcoms on TBS, one keeps lying to the public about his album and one falls off the face of the earth.

Besides, rap biopics and other hip hop-inspired works haven’t been that good to begin with. Remember when Hakeem from Moesha (rest in peace, Hakeem from Moesha) was playing 2Pac to Romany Malco’s MC Hammer in that hilariously awful movie on VH1? Beyoncé can’t really act her way out of wet paper bag, yet she still lands roles in flagrant fouls like Obsessed and Carmen: The Hip Hopera. Hell, Notorious was written by two Black people and, aside from Naturi Naughton exposing her massive milk makers, I found no artistic or replay value after I caught it over at MegaVideo.Com.

It’s 2010, folks. White people have long infiltrated the “secret society” of rap, and many of them are in some ways responsible for the music that’s out today (word to Shake, my melanin-less partner over at the main hustle), there really shouldn’t be any reason for any of us to be up in arms about it. Until they start claiming “Manifest Destiny” on hip-hop. Then we should all be worried.

By the way, does anybody know when Jay-Z’s biography The Black Book, which was supposed to have been written by a Black person, is dropping? I’m just saying.