Rap music was revolutionary not because it brought the animals of the underworld to the art scene. Other mediums did it prior, although to a lesser extent. Rap music was revolutionary because through atomizing the Song, it democratized it: it liberated the art of music and symphony, on one hand, and the literary art of song-writing/story-telling, from each other. So what Rakim is to the Song, is what Brecht is to the Theatre.

Interestingly, democracy in rap music, and art generally, does not seek unity. It presumes equality: symphony and poetry are just fine on their own, but maybe under the right distribution, harmony among non-conforming elements, they can make each other better.

The result was art purity. For a moment, rap music presented itself as a boundary. on each side of that boundary a democracy, each contrasting the other: artistic democracy and political democracy. It did that by making the previously unheard voice talk about the previously untold stories. A rapper can sing about anything, irrespective of history, and purpose and it would give insight on “slums” culture: non-conformity.

But art that doesn’t menace order, is menaced by it. Soon enough the rappers will surrender to the reality of the situation. What followed then is an industry, coming out of the womb of political-democracy, almost exclusively catered to “how to get out of the slums” culture: conformity. And even that it doesn’t do constructively as the illness now lies within incompletion: “how to get out of the slums before you get kicked out of the slums” is far more accurate. For the wanna-be-hipsters of tomorrow need a new place “with character” to live in.

Only a parasite would blame the slum-dog-rappers for this. rather than the other whose idea of taking action upon hearing the previously untold stories was “pay to hear more stories.” Now the rapper says: “sh*t is real, I used to steal but now I own several businesses.” The same circle once again.

If every socio-political conversation, regardless of entry point, can converge to “property” then maybe genocide is possible because unlike refugee camps, the settlements of the colonizer are always notarized.