Who Are the Role Models?

In the July 2007 issue of the XXL magazine there was article featuring rapper Rich Boy in which he addressed the issue of role models in Hip-Hop. Rich Boy well articulated his opinion that role models for youth should not be rappers, athletes or other celebrities but parents. In the article, Rich Boy eloquently talked about how his parents are the role models in his life and expressed how they led by example which made all the difference in how he has chosen to live his life.

The issue of roles models and celebrity is not a new issue. In 1993 NBA legend Charles Barkley sparked controversy when he made a Nike commercial in which he stated, "I am not a role model". Out of all of the criticism that Hip-Hop has gotten, pretty much since its inception, the strongest criticism is that Hip-Hop artists and other prominent figures within the culture are negative role models for the youth.

Well, in response to that, I ask....

Who are the role models?

Now I love Hip-Hop. I grew up very much enthralled by it and as a grown man I still embrace much of it today. But I have never looked at rappers as role models necessarily. I find some of the music inspiring. I find their life stories inspiring. Those who have pulled themselves up from the bottom to reach the top are the epitome of the American dream but that doesn't mean that I'm ready to model my own life from the lives and experiences of Hip-Hop artists.

I think listeners can learn a lot, good and bad, from the experiences of MCs. When Hip-Hop expression is at its best, it can go a long way in making a difference in peoples' lives. I firmly believe that. But parents, teachers, ministers, local business and community leaders shouldn't leave the hands of raising children in the hands of a rapper. Rap songs don't raise children; parents do. It seems to me that parents would rather use Hip-Hop as a scapegoat for their own failures in responsibly rearing their children.

I have no problem saying that MCs like KRS-One, Chuck D and Ice Cube greatly influenced my thought and belief system in the same way my pastor at my church did when I was a kid. Their rhymes about race, class, education, equality, etc. spurred awareness of these important issues in my own life. I didn't take everything they said as fact just like I didn't take everything the preacher in the pulpit was saying as fact. But like the minister, MCs challenge my perceptions and perspectives.

If the rhymes and actions of MCs did influence some of my own thinking and behavior, much of it had to do with the fact that my father played no role in my life and therefore I looked to others to give me guidance in how to move in the "room" that is life. It's a father's responsibility to raise his son; not a rapper. The void in my life that I felt from my father's absence was often filled by not only the music of Hip-Hop music, but also by a variety of people like the older neighborhood "bad boys", ministers, my uncles and others.

Parents must stop blaming Hip-Hop and everything else and start "taking back" their households. The greatest role models in every child's life should be mom and dad. The problem is that it is actually many parents in society that are the real negative role models.