America era of Art of the Trump Presidency.

Trump was the pits but he did unite us against a common enemy of his type of racism and our art reflect that. The artistic highlights from that period had a moral clarity and was really gave us exactly what we wanted to see . Uplifting images or clear bad guys and a focus on the common enemy.

As much as I liked the works mentioned, they really weren't challenging or display any moral ambiguity. They were not "problematic". With Trump in office there was no room for internal dissension.

Trump is gone and now we are seeing more of the internal conflict. More internecine fighting done in public. Asking questions like, what did BLM do with all that money? Atlanta talking about black scammers. Chappelle questioning the alliance between the LGBTQ and Black movement in certain parts of each movement. The battle between progressives and moderates.

Kendrick has made his most personal album (which is saying a lot for a deeply introspective dude) and people are mad because he is voicing some his own problematic thoughts (which btw, he identifies as problematic!) and its not sitting well with people.

I am glad he did it. Art is supposed to challenge you. As much as I loved This is America when it dropped, it was telling that it became the fav of little white girls on tik tok for a minute. I watched the video recently and it's still amazing, but yeah.

I think about how as problematic NWA was, they really created great art that brought police brutality and life in the hood to life. I just doubt they would get the platform to do something like that to do because the bitter truth they rapped about also carried the baggage of their mysogny, homophobic and glorification of violence. I mean its a good to see us as a people evolve and look back and say we don't want to go back there. But it is also important to judge that work within the context of who the people were when they made the song. Just like when Kendrick talks about his own homophobia when he was younger.



Just some ideas I am working out.

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"Everyone has a plan until you punch them in the face. Then they don't have a plan anymore." (c) Mike Tyson

"what's a leader if he isn't reluctant"