TL;DR The standard of people having to really do the criminal things they rap about in order to be respected is stupid

This whole standard throughout the hip-hop community regarding rappers having to “live what they rap about” is tenuous and just stupid

To add to that, because of certain images and lifestyles that are glorified in the mainstream this is mainly referring to street shit

If someone raps about going to McDonald’s, no one is trying to know more like “But is he really livin’ that tho?”, it’s only street shit

All people wanna hear is destructive ignorant shit and they want the artist to really be doing it for their own entertainment no matter what the consequence is

You have people glorifying and praising King Von for being a “real one” because he killed 7 people

It’s ironic because majority of rappers do not live what they rap about, if they did then all of them would be in jail, Bobby Shmurda and Tay-K are examples of what really happens when you do the shit you rap about

But people justify it under the false narrative that people are “forced” to become a criminal due to their background, which is absolute bullshit

No one no matter the background is forced to pick up guns and kill people and no one is forced to go sell drugs, life is about choices no matter what background you come from; the hood produces plenty of nerds, doctors, authors, lawyers and successful people who have never committed a crime ever

Boosie said himself that it’s impossible to be a gangster and a rapper at the same time “We’re just rappin’ man” Click this here for what Boosie has to say

At the end of the day, hip-hop is music, the music industry is a part of the ENTERTAINMENT industry

It’s fucking entertainment, people need to stop taking shit so seriously that has nothing to do with whether the music is good or not

Anyway thanks for reading my ted talk