r e s m a r t e d

Teens & Sexually Degrading Music

On average, American teens listen to one and a half to two and a half hours of music a day. From 50 Cent to Britney Spears, pop and hip-hop music can present a world that’s sexualized mildly or explicitly. Now a new study by conservative think-tank the Rand Corporation makes a connection between sexually explicit lyrics and public health concerns.

Notably, the study found that teens who listen to sexually degrading lyrics are more likely to engage in sexual behaviors at an earlier age.

Rap music is always going to surprise us. I do think that right now, though, we are talking about men specifically and their lyrics. I think if you go to lyrics of artists, say, like Remy Ma or Lil’ Kim or Foxy Brown or even Eve, you’re going to see some pretty darn sexually explicit lyrics where men are being treated very much like objects, and only people from whom money can be taken or people that can be used for sexual favors.

So I think women are already - not in terms of quantity, but definitely in terms - if I can use the word - quality of sexual explicitness, they are already right there. I think rap is going to change in a way that I cannot hope to predict. Is it going to come back to the opposite, you know what I mean? To something sweet and dreamy? I don’t know and I don’t know if I want that. But I do know that we’re going to move past this sort of anger that it seems like rap artists have towards each other, or you know, male rap artists have towards women. And I think we’re going to get to something surprising, and because I’m an optimist, I say I think it’s going to be something good.

full article - npr