LGBTQ representation in hip-hop

Origins (1970s) Hip-hop was developed in the late 1970s following the popularity of disco. Disco music, which contains origins within Black American culture, had an impact on hip-hop from samples to early hip-hop fashion. The disco scene which was derived from disco music was known for its vibrant nightlife that was considered a haven for those in the LGBTQ community, particularly LGBTQ youth of color. Despite these origins, early hip-hop artists expressed anti-LGBTQ sentiments and epithets common of the time in their music. Sugarhill Gang's 1979 song "Rapper's Delight", the first hip-hop record to become a top 40 hit, referred to fictional character Superman as a "fairy" for wearing a skin-tight garment. Soon after the rise of hip-hop in New York, the LA-based openly gay rap group Age of Consent performed their song "Fight Back", an anthem against gay-bashing, at a live rap event in 1981, referring to themselves as "faggot rap" and encouraging other members of the queer community to "fight back" when faced with queer bashing. 1980s–1990s In 1986, the hip-hop trio Beastie Boys originally wanted to name their debut album ''Don't Be A Faggot. Their record label Columbia Records refused to release it under that title, so it changed the title to Licensed to Ill''. Years later, the Beastie Boys formally apologized to the LGBTQ community for the "shitty and ignorant" things they said on their first record. During what was considered third-wave feminism, there was an infusion of Black feminist thought into hip-hop by way of Black women in the genre who emphasized issues of race, gender, and sexuality. This included black LGBTQ musicians like Meshell Ndegeocello whose 1993 album Plantation Lullabies is considered an example of the evolving attitudes and politics of the hip-hop generation, specifically from younger black feminists. According to Andreana Clay, "Ndegeocello's lyrics are a product of early Black feminism, radical lesbian feminism, and hip-hop feminism." In her music, Ndegocello has addressed sexuality and blackness as a black bisexual woman, garnering a following from LGBTQ feminists of color. Her musical content and appearance also drew criticism from certain listeners and radio stations who refused to play her music. The ideas of black queer and lesbian feminism influenced hip-hop during a moment when politics surrounding sexuality, gender, and race were shifting. Further advancements in acceptance of LGBTQ in hip-hop took place through the mid-2010s and the 2020s. In 2012, the Filipino rapper Gloc-9 released the song "Sirena", whose lyrics are a first-person story of a gay man ("bakla") who was initially abused and ostracised by his father for his effeminacy, but reconciled with each other when his father suffered from cancer. In a 2024 interview, Gloc-9 dedicated the song to his son, who came out as gay in 2022. In 2014, rap duo Macklemore and Ryan Lewis joined the United Nations Free & Equal campaign, which aims to advantage equal rights for LGBTQ people around the world. In 2018, rapper Eminem made headlines when he apologized for the first time in his career for previously using homophobic slurs, saying that he now realized "[he] was hurting a lot of other people by saying it." Specifically, Eminem said he regretted calling rapper Tyler, the Creator a "faggot" in his diss track, "Fall". In 2022, rapper Kendrick Lamar received mixed reactions after he released his song "Auntie Diaries", with some praising the track for being pro-LGBTQ. Others criticized Lamar's delivery within the song, as he at some points deadnames his relatives' pronouns and uses the word "faggot". Lamar recalls at the end of the song a previous performance in which he brought out a white female fan to perform his song with him but disapproved of her usage of the word "nigga" because she was not black, to critique himself as a hypocrite for using the word "faggot" when he is not gay. He says, "Faggot, faggot, faggot, we can say it together / But only if you let a white girl say nigga". == Homo hop ==

In the 1990s, the homo hop movement emerged as an underground movement spearheaded by the hip-hop group Rainbow Flava, particularly in California, in part as a reaction to the widespread acceptance of homophobia in the lyrics of mainstream hip-hop performers such as Eminem. Lyrics in songs such as "Criminal" on The Marshall Mathers LP demonstrate this homophobia. Initially coined by Tim'm T. West of Deep Dickollective, although Caushun was later revealed to have been a publicity stunt engineered by heterosexual musician Ivan Matias. and mounted annually until 2008, and the 2006 documentary film Pick Up the Mic. Cazwell described his philosophy of music as "create your own space, your own music and have people come to you," and has noted in interviews that he achieved much greater success by "breaking" the rules of the hip-hop industry than he ever did in his earlier attempts to pursue mainstream success with the 1990s hip-hop duo Morplay. One of the first mainstream artists to speak out publicly against anti-gay discrimination in hip-hop was Kanye West in a 2004 interview with Sway Calloway on MTV News. In the interview Kanye says, "Hip-hop does discriminate against gay people. I want to just come on TV and tell my rappers, my friends, just stop it, fam. Seriously, that's really discrimination". Kanye criticized the hip-hop community, saying, "Hip-hop seemed like it was about fighting for your rights in the beginning, about speaking your mind, and breaking down barriers or whatever, but everybody in hip-hop discriminates against gay people. To me, that's one of the standards in hip-hop is to be like, 'You fag, you gay'". Criticism Some artists have criticized the queer hip-hop genre as an arbitrary label that can potentially limit an artist's audience and may not actually correspond to their artistic goals or career aspirations. In 2013, Brooke Candy told The Guardian: One unspecified artist declined to be interviewed for the Guardian feature at all, stating that he preferred to be known as a rapper rather than as a "gay rapper". Shorey insists that listeners ignore these sexuality-based hip-hop classifications and listen more closely to the quality of music being produced. He also suggests that queer artists should be booked alongside straight artists, showing that they are equally talented, and deserve the same amount of recognition. Commercialization Andre Benjamin, primarily known as André 3000 in hip-hop duo OutKast, has also been noted to wear clothing considered "androgynous" or "gender-bending" while performing as he would be seen in bright, colorful pieces traditionally seen worn by women. His presence in the traditionally masculine genre was seen as one of the few exceptions within the culture, but not without speculations circulating around the music industry about whether or not he was actually straight. In 2008, Andre was quoted at the debut of his men's wear fashion line addressing the opinions of his clothing choices told by Observer: People feel like, just because you like to dress well... that don't mean you're gay! I don't know where that came from!While Andre 3000 has shown his growth of support to the LGBTQ community over the years, his presence in the hip-hop community has served as a reminder that queerness is used as an aesthetic while queer-identifying people in the hip-hop community are degraded or forced to stay behind-the-scenes. As for openly queer artists part of the hip-hop genre, Lil Nas X faced backlash in 2021 for the music video made for his song "Montero (Call Me by Your Name)" with most of the controversy coming from parents along with religious organizations claiming the video was "inappropriate" and "harmful" considering he has built a fanbase of younger children since his release of the song "Old Town Road". Lil Nas X has publicly shared the purpose of the music video is to openly embrace his sexuality while making the effort to bring awareness to the oppressive culture towards the LGBTQ community. The artist took to twitter to further address the controversy while also sharing a letter to his 14-year old self describing his coming-out journey:Dear 14 year old Montero, I wrote a song with our name in it. It's about a guy I met last summer. I know we promised to never come out publicly, I know we promised to never be "that" type of gay person, I know we promised to die with the secret, but this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist. You see this is very scary for me, people will be angry, they will say I'm pushing an agenda. But the truth is, I am. The agenda to make people stay the fuck out of other peoples lives and stop dictating who they should be. sending you love from the future.Other notable artists, such as Fly Young Red, Azealia Banks, Angel Haze, and Young M.A. have openly discussed their sexuality in their lyrics and expression of style further opening the narrative for LGBTQ representation in popular music. == Negative representation of women and homosexuality ==

Gender and sexual diversity among hip-hop artists have existed since the genre's earliest days, yet it has historically and predominantly been perceived as the epitomized expression of Black straight male masculinity and culture, which are usually externalized as the degradation of women and homosexuality within the music and personified as a lifestyle outside the music. In his 2006 documentary Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes, Byron Hurt explores the nuanced relationships between hip-hop, masculinity, misogyny, and homophobia. In the documentary Hurt travels around the country and interviews rap and hip-hop artists, academics, and fans about their perceptions on these issues in the culture. Some successful female artists, such as Nicki Minaj, have attempted to make space within the male-dominated genre by aligning themselves with stereotypical black, hypermasculine hip-hop traits in their music and performance. In Getting Freak with Missy: Missy Elliot, Queer Hip Hop, and the Musical Aesthetics of Impropriety, Elliott H. Powell discusses in detail the approach some female artists, such as Missy Elliott, take in hypersexualizing themselves and engaging in 'impropriety' to make space in the genre by centering herself and her sexuality over that of the male subject. However, Kehrer points out that all of the above examples "challenge but [do] not necessarily disrupt the status quo" of the black, hypermasculine straight male within hip-hop, unlike black queer masculine female artists. The specific brand of female masculinity which these female artists embody is neither temporarily clad for performance nor is it undermined by heterosexuality or a traditional femininity. in 2018 Young M.A. is a prominent queer masculine rapper who exemplifies this dichotomy. As someone who embodies a natural female masculinity within the genre, her masculinity fits directly with the style of hip-hop such that she does not need to fit herself onto it like feminine or heterosexual female artists must. To combat this dismissal of her sexuality (i.e., an attempt to make her queer identity invisible), as well as the paradoxical but simultaneous hypervisibility she receives as a queer masculine woman rapper that elicits this abuse in the first place, she distances herself from the labels "lesbian rapper" and "woman rapper." She has also been criticized for her music video, "Cocaine," which is a cautionary commentary on the dangers of drug use, but which has been accused of depicting an abusive same-sex relationship between two women. Some scholars argue that the criticisms Syd has experienced is a result of the unique tension between the cultural significance of the genre in Black culture and the homophobia which pervades the genre. == Controversy over homophobic lyrics ==

Ice-T stated on his autobiography that record-label executive Seymour Stein took exception to a line in his song "409": "Guys grab a girl, girls grab a guy / If a guy wants a guy, please take it outside". Ice-T later became one of the first rappers to condemn homophobia on songs such as "Straight Up Nigga" and "The Tower" on his album O.G. Original Gangster (1991). Many songs by rapper Eminem have been considered homophobic for his frequent use of anti-gay slurs, especially the song "Criminal" from his third album The Marshall Mathers LP (2000), which contains lines like: "My words are like a dagger with a jagged edge, That'll stab you in the head, whether you're a fag or les', Or a homosex, hermaph or a trans-a-vest, Pants or dress, hate fags? The answer's 'yes. In an interview with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes, Eminem denied being homophobic and explained the frequent use of the term "faggot" in his lyrics, stating that this word was "thrown around constantly" in battle rap, and that he does not use it to refer to gay people. The Marshall Mathers LP was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards 2001, which led to protests due to the album's controversial content. At the show, Eminem performed "Stan" with openly gay musician Elton John in response. Eminem experienced more backlash in 2018, after he released his surprise album Kamikaze. On December 11, 2017, rapper Tyler, The Creator tweeted "dear god this song is horrible sheesh how the fuck", which fans quickly realized was directed at Eminem's new single at the time, "Walk On Water". On the track "Fall" from Kamikaze, Eminem responded to Tyler, The Creator's criticisms, where he raps "Tyler create nothin', I see why you call yourself a faggot, bitch / It's not because you lack attention, it's because you worship D12's balls, you're sacrilegious", although, the slur was notably edited in the song and video. This is most likely in relation to Tyler's sexuality being a major spectacle within his fanbase, with a lot of his lyrics hinting at homosexuality. Before the album was released, however, the slur was censored. Eminem joined Sway Calloway in a series of interviews after Kamikazes release, where he explained that he regretted using the slur against Tyler. "In my quest to hurt him, I realized that I was hurting a lot of other people by saying it. At the time, I was so mad, it was just whatever...", "...it was one of the things I kept going back to, going 'I don't feel right with this. Justin Vernon, who provided the chorus for "Fall", publicly condemned Eminem's language on the song, tweeting "Was not in the studio for the Eminem track... came from a session with BJ Burton and Mike Will. Not a fan of the message, it's tired. Asked them to change the track, wouldn't do it...". In 2020, Eminem released his album Music To Be Murdered By, in which he collaborated on a song with openly queer New York rapper Young M.A. The early work of rapper Tyler, The Creator was heavily criticized for homophobic lyrics. Goblin, in particular, was found by publication NME to have used homophobic language 213 times throughout the album. One particular example was in the song "Tron Cat", where Tyler states: "Rashes on my dick from licks of shish-kebab sagets, in some Kanye West glasses screaming out, fuck faggots!" Tyler responded to these pieces in a later NME interview, stating: "I'm not homophobic. I just think 'faggot' hits and hurts people. It hits." Tyler responded in a joking matter with the quote, "If Tegan and Sara need some hard dick, hit me up!" In 2020, rappers Insane Clown Posse denounced past use of homophobic slurs in their lyrics, saying that, "We wanted to be like gangsta rap, and gangsta rap said it all the time," but "There was never a time when we had a problem with gay people." In the lyrics of one song on rapper Trick Trick's 2008 album The Villain, he refers to Ellen DeGeneres and Rosie O'Donnell as "dyke bitches" and says that he will send a "scud missile right through their fucking cruise ship". Trick Trick expressed his dislike towards homosexuals in an interview with music site AllHipHop: "Faggots hate me and I don't give a fuck. I don't want your faggot money any goddam way." The phrase "No homo" is often used in today's hip-hop lyrics and black culture. It means "no gay things" or "nothing gay". One example of the term's usage is in the Jay-Z song, "Run This Town". Kanye West, one of the featured artists on the song, stated, "It's crazy how you can go from being Joe Blow / to everybody on your dick...no homo." ==Evolution==

By the early 2010s, a new wave of openly LGBTQ hip-hop musicians began to emerge, spurred in part by the increased visibility and social acceptance of LGBTQ people, the coming out of mainstream hip-hop stars such as Azealia Banks and Frank Ocean, and the release of LGBTQ-positive songs by heterosexual artists such as Murs, Macklemore, and Ryan Lewis. Although inspired and empowered by the homo hop movement, Accordingly, many of the newer artists were identified in media coverage with the newer "queer hip-hop" label instead of "homo hop". The following year, Jipsta released a cover of the George Michael song "I Want Your Sex", which rose to the #4 position on the Billboard Dance Club Play chart in only 4 weeks time, resulting in the first Top 5 Billboard charting record by an LGBTQ hip-hop artist. In March 2014, New York rapper Le1f became the first openly-gay rapper to appear on The Late Show with David Letterman. During the performance, Le1f rapped "Wut," a popular track from his EP Hey, while accompanied by a group of backup dancers, producer Moody, and Blood Orange. In March 2014, the online magazine Norient.com published a first overview of queer hip-hop videos worldwide. The article talks about topics, aesthetics and challenges of LGBTQ hip-hop in Angola, Argentina, Cuba, Germany, Israel, Serbia, South Africa and the USA." Increasingly, focus on the development of queer voices in the international hip-hop community has gained more precedent with articles published looking at how Queer rappers use the art-form as a type of therapy. A Winter 2016 article from Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education looked at how utilizing the art-form helped challenge traditional notions of hip-hop and sexual identity. In December 2016, Los Angeles-based rapper Thed Jewel, who raps "My skin is black, sexuality is Fuchsia" said: "There are a lot of rappers that are homosexuals and their day to be open with it will come one way or another". In August 2018, openly gay member of Brockhampton, Kevin Abstract voiced his efforts to change hip-hop's issue with homophobia in an interview with the BBC by stating: "I have to exist in a homophobic space in order to make change and that homophobic space would be the hip-hop community. So me just existing and being myself is making change and making things easier for other young queer kids". In June 2019, Lil Nas X, who performed the hit song "Old Town Road", took the opportunity to publicly come out during Pride Month, making him one of the most visible Black queer male singers to do so, especially in country or hip-hop genres, which emphasize machismo and "historically snubbed queer artists". In June 2022, Teen Vogue covered American rapper Saucy Santana – who is both openly queer and feminine. In the interview, Santana discusses of his 2019 song "Material Girl", which ended up going viral on TikTok in late 2021. He also talks about his experience as a Black queer rapper, stating: "Before, I didn't want to be labeled a gay rapper," he recalls, "Then, in the middle of my career, I started to embrace it because I just felt like it was helpful to my culture and to my people." ==Notable artists== • 070 Shake • Abdu Ali • Angel Haze • Anye Elite • Backxwash • Azealia Banks • Bali Baby • BbyMutha • Big Dipper • Big Freedia • Brooke Candy • Cakes da Killa • Da Brat • Deadlee • Delli Boe • D'Lo • Doechii • Doja Cat • Drebae • Drew Mason • Frank Ocean • God-Des and She • House of Ladosha • ILoveMakonnen • Isaiah Rashad • Jai'Rouge • Jay Dillinger (aka Marlon Williams) • Jesse Dangerously • Jipsta • Jonny Makeup • Jonny McGovern • Juba Kalamka • Katastrophe • Kae Tempest • Katey Red • Kehlani • Kevin Abstract • Kidd Kenn • K.Flay • Pierre Kwenders • Lady Sovereign • Le1f • Lil Nas X • Lil Peep • Lil Phag • Lil Uzi Vert • Lucas Charlie Rose • Megan Thee Stallion • Melange Lavonne • Mykki Blanco • Nicky da B • ppcocaine • Princess Nokia • QBoy • RoxXxan • Saucy Santana • Saul Williams • Sissy Nobby • Sasha Sathya • Shorty Roc • Soce, the elemental wizard • Solomon • Steve Lacy • Syd tha Kid • Taylor Bennett • Tim'm T. West • Titica • Tori Fixx • TT the Artist • Tyler, the Creator • Willow Smith • Will Sheridan • Yo Majesty • Zebra Katz == See also ==