Hip Hop and Censorship

Hip hop has probably encountered more problems with censorship than any other form of popular music in recent years, due to its extreme use of profanity. For example, Public Enemy's "Gotta Give the Peeps What They Need" was edited without their permission, removing the words "free Mumia"
After the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, Oakland, California group The Coup was under fire for the cover art on their Party Music, which featured the group's two members holding a detonator as the Twin Towers exploded behind them. Ironically, this art was made months before the attacks. The group, having politically radical and Marxist lyrical content, said the cover meant to symbolize the destruction of capitalism. Their record label pulled the album until a new cover could be designed.
The use of profanity as well as graphic representation of violence and sex makes challenges in the broadcast of such material both on television stations such as MTV, in music video form, and on radio. As a result, many hip hop recordings are broadcast in censored form, with offending language "bleeped" or blanked out of the soundtrack (though usually leaving the backing music intact), or even replaced with "clean" lyrics. The result – which sometimes translates the remaining lyrics inarticulate or conflicting with the original recording – has become almost as widely identified with the genre as any other aspect of the music, and has been parodied in films such as Austin Powers in Goldmember, in which a character performed a imatation of a hip hop music video – performs an entire verse that is blanked out. In 1995 Roger Ebert wrote:[7]
“ Rap has a bad reputation in white circles, where many people believe it consists of obscene and violent anti-white and anti-female guttural. Some of it does. Most does not. Most white listeners don't care; they hear black voices in a litany of discontent, and tune out. Yet rap plays the same role today as Bob Dylan did in 1960, giving voice to the hopes and angers of a generation, and a lot of rap is powerful writing." ”
In a way to avoid broadcasting regulations BET has formed a late-night segment called "Uncut" to air uncensored videos. Not only has this translated into greater sales for mainstream artists, it has also provided an opening for undiscovered artists to grab the spotlight with graphic but low production quality videos, often made cheaply by non-professionals. Perhaps the most notorious video aired, which for many came to exemplify BET's program Uncut, was "Tip Drill" by Nelly. While no more explicit than other videos, its exploitative depiction of women, particularly of a man swiping a credit card between a stripper's buttocks, was seized upon by many social activists for condemnation. The segment was discontinued in mid 2006.