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    Diddy’s Message To Hip-Hop’s Youth: “It’s For Everyone To Enjoy But For Us To Own”

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    Devin Ch

    November 14, 2018 12:54
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     David Becker/Getty Images

    Diddy shares a lesson in business, branding, and cultural integrity.

    Diddy is a staunch proponent of “Black Excellence.” Much has been made about Diddy’s insistence of a change in narrative speaking, a social movement he hopes will encourage Black entrepreneurship, and self-governance. His most recent message of empowerment was posted via Instagram. In the captioned video (below), a bunch of Caucasian kids simulate a rap video with tons of props and gesticulations common to mainstream rap. The children sit atop a parked vehicle with wads of money. The boy with long-ish hair uses one hand to grip his bundle of cash, and the other to simulate a “toppy” motion below his waistline.

    Diddy’s message is clear and concise: he is evidently pushing for more equitable decision-making and integrity with the culture/industry. Without saying it outright, Diddy is pushing more than one racial-narrative at once. Firstly, he might be suggesting that would-be practitioners not sign with Lyor Cohen-types for the sake of retaining their authorship.

    Secondly, Diddy appears to be pushing for a more committed “FUBU” mentality from fellow Black entrepreneurs, rappers, and creative types. Diddy admits: hip-hop has become a “global resource,” and there’s no sense in limiting its dissemination to relative “outsiders;” without proper acknowledgment, the culture, as he would have it, stands the firm possibility of erosion.

    The video of the kids simulating the “culture” from an outsider’s perspective is but an after-effect of this erosion, and perhaps not the problem itself. The real issue is rooted in the laws of supply and demand. Diddy is fearful of the tangent he may have started.

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