Hilburn’s Defense of Rap--Fans and Foes React : No Lack of Attention

Is Hilburn living on the same planet that I am? He claims that rap music has been relegated to “largely underground status” and receives “scant national airplay.” I pulled out my latest issue of Rolling Stone and found that several of the top spots on the charts were held by rap groups, including M.C. Hammer at No. 2 and Public Enemy at No. 6.

I hear rap music utilized constantly in commercial advertisements, public service messages and nationally syndicated TV shows.

Wasn’t that Run DMC running neck and neck with Woody in the “Tour de Lite” TV commercial? How about the Lakers’ “Just Say No to Drugs!” video a couple seasons back? And who could forget that god-awful “We Are the Bears,” which showcased the rapping abilities of Jim McMahon and William (The Refrigerator) Perry? Didn’t Theo Huxtable perform a rap song on the nation’s No. 1 TV show? Heck, rap even has its own TV show, “Yo! MTV Raps!”

I have had the opportunity to teach both in the inner city (South-Central Los Angeles) and a rural environment. From what I can tell, kids everywhere can’t get enough rap music. If they could memorize their times tables as well as they memorize rap lyrics, my job would be cake.

Hilburn’s theory that rap’s message is lost on white, middle-class, college-educated “observers” because it employs literary devices from the inner-city culture borders on racism. Could you imagine someone getting away with saying the reverse? That black, inner-city “observers” were confused over the message of another musical genre because it utilized literary devices foreign to their dialect? Come on, Robert, give us some credit.

Hilburn is getting farther and farther out of touch. Having him write a rap overview is like having James Watt write the Sierra Club newsletter. I just don’t think he gets it.

JOSEPH P. HUBBELL

Grover City, Calif.