Charlamagne, I apologize for offending you, sir. Even though you have been an asshole your entire career and continue to hurt many feelings, I understand that your feelings can too be hurt. And you’re welcome for all the inspiration that I give you. At first, I was mad that famous people kept repeating shit that they read on my blog, because it felt like plagiarism. Then, I realized that I’m doing this shit almost exclusively to influence receptive people, and some of those people just so happen to be popular enough to spread my messages to larger audiences. Then again, those are my thoughts that said people are seemingly attempting to pass off as their own. Yet and still, I don’t want to insult or turn away people who are inspired and influenced by me enough to adopt my ideologies. Any who, we’re moving on. “I think I did it again. I made you believe—we’re more than just friends. Oh baby, it might seem like a crush. But it doesn’t mean—that I’m serious. Because to lose all my senses—that’s just so typically me. Oh baby, baby. Oops! I did it again. I played with your heart—got lost in the game. Oh baby, baby. Oops! You think I’m in love—that I’m sent from above. I’m not that innocent!” Britney Spears was out here portraying an angelic persona, being promiscuous, breaking motherfuckers off with some of that heavenly hole, making them fall in love, then crushing their souls! How often do you just sit and listen to lyrics in songs? As an intellectual and a longtime enjoyer of wordplay, I naturally notice when people are trying to be slick with their words. Of course, I was a big Dr. Seuss fan when I was young, even though I was never really impressed with those simple rhymes. Growing up, I knew that I’d always be smarter and more mature than the people around me because I never really liked stupid music or childish people. Being black and having been raised in the inner city, hip hop was a constitutional part of my environment. And while I was pleased with music from artists like the Hot Boys and Three 6 Mafia, I was intrinsically drawn to music with more substance—like that of A Tribe Called Quest and OutKast. As an ATLien, I must note that Big Boi doesn’t get the credit that he deserves as a rapping-ass motherfucker. Andre 3000 is great, his voice is alluring and he be talkin’ sometimes, but stop sleeping on Daddy Fat Sacks! Back in the day, I hated school, and I attended several different high schools. My mom once tried to enroll me into Tri-Cities High School, the school that OutKast attended as teens, but I had missed too many credits and the school’s administration didn’t want anything to do with me. So, I ended up going to an alternative school called “McClarin” in College Park, GA. Tri-Cities is in East Point, GA. McClarin was easy, laid-back, and dismissal was at like 1:30pm, but I still skipped class. Everything just isn’t for everybody, and I’ve always had trouble doing things that I simply don’t want to do. However, where I missed lessons in school, I picked up knowledge from hip hop. Amongst many valuable things, hip hop taught me that I wasn’t wrong for choosing to stay true to myself as opposed to conforming to a norm. Intelligent people don’t like being told what to do, and we for damn sure aren’t going to let anyone dictate our beliefs. So, it’s fitting that unintelligent or less cognitive people eschew both profound lyrics in music and nonconformist paths in life. That’s not a snub, it’s a mere observation. For argument’s sake, you can try to call me stupid for being a high school dropout, but I can return the sentiment by highlighting the fact that no course in any level of education teaches people to be intelligent. Like I be sayin’, educations provide information whereas intelligence provides the capacity to understand and apply information. If you haven’t learned that yet, what does that tell you?
If you could be the biggest artist in any genre of music, what genre would it be? Obviously, because I’m smart, I’d want to be a popstar. I’ve literally never listened to one Taylor Swift song in its entirety—at least not to my recollection—but she’s nearly unarguably the most powerful American celebrity in modern history. Swift’s latest album, “The Tortured Poets Department”, moved over 2.6 million units in its first week, after debuting at number one on Billboard’s Hot 200. Taylor referred to Kim Kardashian as a high school bully on a track from the new album, and Kim lost approximately 100k followers on Instagram as a result. For shits and giggles, what do you think would happen if Taylor Swift called Beyoncé a nigger? I may be going out on a limb here, but Taylor Swift is so powerful, I think Beyoncé would lose more social media followers than Taylor if Taylor berated Beyoncé with a racial epithet. I know that sounds crazy, but is the world not a fucked-up place? If shit still sounds crazy to you, you should have skipped school and listened to hip hop like I did. Rappers have gotten away with saying a lot of vile, vicious, venomous, and vulgar things. And aside from Nas likening himself to Nostradamus before the spurious Y2K scare, many rappers have proven to provide predictive accuracy as it pertains to consequential world events. Granted, the greatest deal of hypotheses have a fifty-fifty chance of accuracy. For instance, in a war, the last men standing win. And if one side has shown dominance in the past, and someone predicts their victory over the presumably inferior side, said prediction isn’t indicative of clairvoyance—it’s just an educated guess. However, if someone correctly prophesies the war starting subsequent to an unforeseeable event, that person could be considered clairvoyant. Personally, I don’t believe in predicting the future. But I have confidence in intelligent people’s ability to utilize their comprehension capabilities to anticipate things that most people are oblivious to. Rapping is just translating thoughts in an artistic manner. And some of the best rappers are simultaneously the most intelligent because creativity and comprehension correlate. If creativity is thinking outside the box, or using your imagination, how can someone who conforms be exceptionally creative? If you’re a conformist, you’re too focused on being accepted and following conventions to be inventive. Conformity works because the majority of people don’t like to go against the grain, so conservatives rely on each other to keep what’s already accepted and established popular. I don’t mean this in a derogatory way, but Taylor Swift is white as fuck—she’s conformity in its most common form. And I’m not saying there’s something wrong with that, but it’s fucking boring. I’m also not saying that boring is bad, but how interesting can boring be? Obviously, this sounds a little silly after I just acknowledged that one of the most boring celebrities on the planet is also one of the most powerful. But Taylor Swift doesn’t have much to teach anyone. She does everything the way it’s historically been done, there’s almost nothing creative about her, and I wonder what benefit her influence provides to her followers in today’s world. Conversely, if the world is fucked-up, and Taylor is the opposite of that, her positivity could promote positivity. Yet, in my opinion, the last thing we need right now is more of the same. What’s the purpose of powerless power? What has Taylor Swift inspired people to do other than watch boring-ass American football and unfollow celebrities that she dislikes? For the record, I don’t hate Taylor Swift, and I believe that her overall success is warranted. My point is, from my perspective, Taylor Swift doesn’t deserve the power that she has—she hasn’t earned it. A few hit pop songs, a squeaky clean persona, and a modelesque figure shouldn’t be enough to retain so much attention and acclaim. The moral of the story is, be bold, be brave, and for the love of God, use your fucking imagination! Peace.