I think someone already touched on this, but I'm gonna say it anyway.

The way I see it, there are two different Eminem's running around right now. There's the skilled, creative, solid "underground" eminem (aka the one from "Infinite"), and there's the TRL Pop Icon Eminem, which is the one that about 98% of the population knows of.

Bottom line, Eminem has reached such huge success due to the fact that he is a blonde-haired, blue eyed white boy who happens to be able to rhyme, which automatically makes him the new posterboy for every pop network and magazine, which in turn results in adoration from millions of 13 year old girls and confused white suburban young men (usually around the age of 15) everywhere.

Now don't get me wrong, Em has skill ( i mean, I do actually own MMLP, SSLP, and Infinite) but his skill has been so watered down to the point that now MTV and the general public have been pushing him just to keep up with the NSyncs and Britney Spears of the world. I mean, it's to the point now where em is one of those people on shows like TRL that gets a video retired one day, and the next day already has a new video out, which two days later will hit the number one spot.

But enough about TRL. Back to Eminem. Like I was saying, he is talented ("Stan" off of MMLP showed Eminem's potential as a serious lyricist). But because of his huge success, it seems to me he has created this controversial image, and resulted to such childish material, just so that the media will hate him, and he will disappear from the public's main focus (which I think could be good for him, because it could probably revive his style and hunger a little). But I repeat, he is talented.

More talented than Common? No. Mos Def? No. Black Thought? No. Rakim? HELL NO. But Eminem is still a skilled lyricist (and he is not in the Vanilla Ice category, He actually has legitimate talent) . Is he at the top of the list? absoulutely not. Do other emcees like Common and Mos, for example, deserve just as much, if not more, acclaim and attention? HELL YES.

But it really all comes down to this.

IS EMINEM AS SUCCESSFUL AS HE IS RIGHT NOW SIMPLY BECAUSE OF THE FACT THAT HE IS WHITE?

YES.

WILL THAT MENTALITY EVER CHANGE?

PROBABLY NOT. As much as people say there's equality in this country now, we all know that millions of people in this country are still closet racists and homophobes, and the fact is, like I said, Eminem is marketed at suburban america, and what middle aged mother wants her 12 year-old daughter coming up to her at the register at the grocery store with a magazine with a black man in a kufi (that's what they're called, right?).

Eminem is a pop superstar. Simply because he's W-H-I-T-E. And until people open their minds, this isn't ever gonna change. END OF DISCUSSION.

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It's useless for me to even put anything here anymore.