Now mind you I don't really care if men nowadays don't act the same way their fathers did, in fact I'd find it boring and unfortunate if they did.

But you're right, cats are protective about their favourite rappers. The first time I remember this happening was Tupac. I mean prior to Shakur men straight deified Rakim, KRS, Cube, Chuck Melle Mel and them, but those discussions were all on technique and controversies in songs, no one knew about those rappers lives, shit I didn't even know their real names, and didn't care to back then.

Tupac got discussed differently. He was sacrosanct even while alive, and I think he established a template for the way you like your favourite rapper: unwaveringly. Rappers like Jay, em, and Kanye benefitted from that I feel.

Also tho, cats forget that rap, like comedy clubs, is mostly populated by beta males. This music was a compensation for some deficiency, social or physical. Some of the personas were grand - King Tee, Africa Bam, Slick Rick, but there were just as many rappers who were jokesters, or lookin for love, or whatever. The 90s I feel had a lot of beta males like De La, Tribe and Pharcyde even Redman's best songs are him playing up being a schlub. Rappers who are this relatable are hard to ride for in that stannish way you speak of. Alpha males tho, they got pushed to the forefront by the Major labels in the late 90s it seems. And i feel THAT is what Master P lucked into: that raw, stupid boyish devotion that death row had for a while. I feel like the main rap stars this past decade were all shades and bombast, whether down south or NYers like Dipset. Just being an everyman rap group like Slaughterhouse is risky nowadays. A&Rs and the such seemed to only push assured A type rappers, maybe for the fans they engender, who were open to brand marketing ( no one would have bought a tribe called quest vitamin water, but it fit for 50 cent).

The other part of this is that I feel teen rap fans are the first rap fans whose mothers actually like this music, and know rappers and songs. I think young men might be getting their attitudes towards music more so from their mothers, who also were drawn to the new alpha male rappers of the late nineties. Perhaps this is another effect of Tupac, but that might be reading too much into it. This last theory might read like bullshit, but I think the big unwritten story in the last thirty years is simply black women being paid and educated at a more accelerated rate than their male counterparts. Any UN field worker will tell you, change the women of a country, you just changed the culture.