Hip-hop icon Jermaine Dupri had some interesting comments regarding the state of women in rap today. During a recent interview with People TV ahead of the WE tv documentary based on his iconic career, the music mogul was asked who among some of the rising female stars in the rap game are his favorite, to which he really had no response.
“I can’t really say,” Dupri began as the hosts specifically inquired about Meg Thee Stallion and Cardi B. “The only reason why I can’t say is because I feel they’re all rapping about the same things. I don’t think they’re showing us who’s the best rapper. I think they’re trying to show—for me, it’s like strippers rapping.”
“As far as rap goes, I’m not getting who is the best rapper, I’m getting like, ‘Ok, you got a story about you dancing in the club, you got a story about you dancing in the club, you got a story about you dancing in the club,’ it’s like ok, who’s going to be the rapper?” he continued.
After the hosts pressed him further to divulge on what he wants to hear from women in the rap game, he gave a vague response.
“At some point, somebody’s going to have to break out of that mold and just show us—talk about other things, just rap about other things besides that,” Dupri said.
Dupri’s comments are his opinion which he’s totally entitled to, but as the hot girl summer wages on, it’s interesting that so many of our male counterparts seem to be especially bothered with the subject matter that women rap about.
After almost 50 years of a male dominated industry where women have also been subjected to men pontificating on the same subjects (money, cars, women and clothes) women in the game now need to come up with more compelling subject matters? Why?
If hip-hop is supposed to be about life experiences and “keeping it 100” I see nothing wrong with women rappers who started in the strip club, tell their stories on the center stage.
And as women in rap continue to rise, (there are more female rappers on the Billboard Chart in 2019 then there have been in any other year in the past decade) some will just have to get used to it.
