Don’t Celebrate Black Artists Topping This Summer’s Streaming Music Charts
Posted on September 10, 2015
If you take a look at the songs most streamed over this summer, one thing is blatantly clear: Black rappers were all the rave. While this might seem like a “Mama we made it!” moment, it most definitely is not a cause for celebration. It’s just another example of White consumption of “Black culture” without real appreciation for Black excellence.
This week, Huffington Post shared the top 10 streamed songs across different platforms. And while popular news site News One declared this as Black artists “making history”, there are some landmarks that we shouldn’t be totally and blindly proud of. Taking one second to think beyond the melanin content of the top artists’ epidermis, we can see that the success of these songs is not a sign of progress or a more inclusive music industry. It is the all too familiar commoditization of Black culture … to Blacks’ detriment.