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Mr.Simmons finds himself in a unique position to be able to profit off the misfortunate labels that have been propagated and made popular by some rap artists today. If the African American community cannot reach a consensus on how it is going to positively project itself now and in the future then we are doomed as a people! We are killing our self's with guns, knifes, drugs, self deprecation, self loafing,self pity and now the spoken word! If all we can aspire too is how we look in a pair of baggy pants in the 21st Century then we are truly doomed. We need to expose the hypocrites like Mr.Simmons for what they are, the new slave masters and tune into what it means to hold self empowerment from men and women like Tavis Smiley and Maya Angelou. 'nough said!

I think Mr. Simmons sets a wonderful example. What we often forget is that hip hop stars are people. As they grow morally they do better moral work. And good for him for saying something positive regardless of the publics cynicism.

His postulate is wrong: they are poets to express inner feelings does not equal promotion of guns, cocaine-inspired crazed misogyny, and machine gun
sprayed f, s, n, and w words.
So he's gonna build his mansion on long island with his asian and white wives, but wash his hands of the effects of
his filthy lucre commerce.

Rappers have a "poetic licence" "99% of the time they are referring to race". Is he joking?? Wow, amazing how such a clear minded person can become so hypocritical so quickly.

I'm shocked by the racism of these comments...

Does Mr. Simmons feel the need to metion god, since his comments are touching on universal human empathy?

I think Mr. Simmons is a hypocrite. I saw Tavis Smiley on PBS a few weeks ago. To make a long story short, Mr. Simmons basically called Mr. Smiley a house nigger; I don't recall exactly why.

Some time after this incident, Mr. Smiley had Mr. Simmons on his show again because Mr. Simmons said he would apologize. While on the show, Mr. Simmons refused to apologize.

Now Mr. Simmons is writing self-help books, go figure.

In the A.M. New York paper today, I saw an article from the AP about the City of Detroit's funeral (complete with grave site & tombstone) for the death of the "N word."

With the continual (and perhaps excessive) use of the word in modern rap, I was curious if Mr. Simmons believes Detroit's mock funeral may have any actual effect in decreasing soceity's use of the word on a national scale?

Personally, I believe it is the music that keeps the word alive through its influence on the youth (our subsequent future generations) and thus it is not until the music industry proactively and blatantly seeks to eliminate its use, that the word's use will be eliminated on a national scale.