Exploitation of Women and Hip Hop

Hip-hop is the latest significant display of the past and current experience as well as the combined awareness of African-American and Latino-American youth. But more than any genre of music of the past, it also expresses normal American ideas that have now been internalized and set in into the mind of American people of color over time.
A part of the learned typical American culture is sexism and misogyny. Hip-hop culture is often destined for its exploitation of women. Hip-hop can be explored and used as a valuable tool in investigating gender relations. It brings the issues that face many young people, such as discrimination, peer relations, and self-worth that can be considered in order to bring about change in the aspects of hip-hop culture and American culture, in general. For young people that do not hold sexist ideals, hip-hop may influence them to do so as it spreads and constantly gains popularity. And others are directly and indirectly supporting an environment that allows sexism to continue.
Exploitation of women in hip-hop culture has become an accepted part of it for both the artists and audiences alike, and many critics blame the music without looking any deeper as to who the artist is behind the lyrics. When going to any hip-hop related event, women tend to feel as though they need to be prepared to be verbally, and physically abused. So they have to watch what hot how they carry themselves, and have to be careful of what they choose to wear, and watch what they say. Much of the music and many videos specifically send out, promote, and effect negative images of black women. All women, but mostly black women in particular are seen in popular hip-hop culture as sex objects. Almost every hip-hop video that is regularly played or listened to today show many dancing women (usually surrounding one or two men) wearing not much more than bikinis, with the cameras focusing on their body parts. These images are shown to go along with a lot of the explicit lyrics that commonly have name calling to suggest that women are not worth anything more than money, if that. Women are described as being only good for sexual relations by rappers who describe their life as being that of a pimp.