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Professor Green defends rap from riot accusations

By | Published on Thursday 11 August 2011

Professor Green

The rioting and looting that has spread around the UK over the last week has touched the music world in different ways. Obviously, many labels became victims after the fire at the Sony DADC/[PIAS] distribution centre on Monday. But yesterday came the inevitable accusation that music was to blame for everything anyway – rap specifically, of course.

The Mirror’s political correspondent Paul Routledge wrote in his column yesterday: “I blame the pernicious culture of hatred around rap music, which glorifies violence and loathing of authority (especially the police but including parents), exalts trashy materialism and raves about drugs. The important things in life are the latest smart phone, fashionable trainers and jeans and idiot computer games. No wonder stores selling them were priority looting targets. Stir into this lethal mixture, the fostering of irrational anger against the world and disrespect for others, and the end result is self-absorbed young people living at boiling point”.

Quick to respond from the urban music camp was rapper Professor Green, who took to Twitter to say: “You had to be at East Dance at Glasto to see the damage urban music does: people of all colours and classes enjoying themselves. Terrible. Paul Routledge is an absolute moron. An absolute fucking moron. Yeah, ban rap music, silence our voices even more. Ignorant prick. Surely this isn’t about shifting the blame, but accepting responsibility? Neither my music nor that of my peers is to blame for society and its faults. We didn’t create the tiers”.

Excellent. I think rap has won that one. From now on, I think everyone who blames music for anything should be forced to do so in the form of song. And within the genre they are railing against.



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