Speaking with HipHopDX ahead of his Converse Rubber Tracks performance at the Echoplex in Los Angeles this past weekend, Vince Staples broke down his thoughts on the ongoing controversy of Iggy Azalea’s place in Hip Hop and the issue of cultural appropriation within the genre.
“I do not care,” Staples said in a clip that debuted as a part of today’s DX Daily. “White people invented basketball. I don’t care. Why would I care? She getting paid. We speak English, we go to Christian churches. It’s the same thing. Yeah it’s fucked up but you just now getting a whiff of that? That’s what it is. Nobody got mad when Eminem did it. Why you mad at her ’cause she a girl and Eminem would probably slap you? It’s more than that. Azealia Banks got a point with the stuff she saying. Everybody got a point. But at the end of the day we all just got jobs. That’s the way I look at it because a lot of things are culture, you never know where none of this shit come from, man. Of course Hip Hop is something that’s very important to Black people but it’s a lot of other things that are important to us that we tend to neglect like family structure. It is what it is. It happens.
“Everybody entitled to their opinion,” he added. “I stay out of all that. I don’t wanna argue with nobody. I wanna be able to pay my rent and I need a carwash right now so I’m ’bout to go do that. I’m just happy I’m able to do the little stuff. I don’t care, all that bigger picture—ain’t nobody give a fuck when my homies got shot in their face. So if you talk about, ‘What you care about?’ That’s what I care about. When the police start paying for some funerals and something like that instead of softball games then I’ll probably have something to say about that issue. It just don’t relate to me. I come from a different place. We got white people [who] gangbang. We got white boys from the hood. Are they appropriating Black culture? Yeah, but them is my niggas because they care just as much as me. Who are you to say what somebody actually love? You can’t say what touched anybody any kind of way. I don’t think that’s up to me personally. That’s not up to me. She might love Hip Hop to her core. That might be what she always wanted to do when she was younger because she seen it on the TV but that’s the reason everybody wanted to do it. We just happen to look like them.”
“We speak English, we go to Christian churches. It’s the same thing.”
Well, we didn’t really have a choice. Also, fuck church.
But u do w sports and bball..his point is we all use eachothers inventions and if u wanna segregate by who started what make sure u go all the way
You can tell the boy stupid as hell, because Eminem represented that raw hip-hop element and earned his keep in battles. You can’t compare izzy or whatever to Eminem because Em tore the bassment up, Em tore the radio shows up, and Em represented hip-hop as something more than a free for all cash grab. Motherfuckers that aren’t about that shit don’t get it, and can only compare the two on a superficial level; Em earned his spot in history through hard work during a time when it was next to impossible for white people to stand out in the culture. He wasn’t the first, but he was he first to succeed. At the end of the day, izzy ain’t a rapper or a hip-hop artist, she’s a pop singer. Motherfuckers get that twisted and say stupid shit. The only affiliation izzy has to hip-hop is that she apparently slept with some black dudes along the way, and by that logic your neighborhood snow bunny would be a hip-hop artist if she ever stepped into a recording studio, regardless of what she sings or even whether she can sing or not to begin with. Fuck all you dumb young motherfuckers with your dumbass social media and your fucking bullshit, y’all don’t even know how hard it was back then. Motherfuckers had to work for their shit, and for a lot of dudes even their hardest wasn’t enough because there’s tons of dudes from the 90’s and onwards that never found commercial success, black or white, regardless of being talented out the ass.
Regardless of Eminems’ talent, when he came out, there was even more controversy than this. Hip hop were not as welcoming as you might want to remember. He was seen as vanilla ice to many people, then his pop tracks were seen as appropriation. It wasn’t until around eminem show that he got the lvl of acceptance that he got.
As much as I think Eminem is a fruit, he actually raps about his real life, or at least the horrible things that go on in his head. Iggy is a talentless Australian broad that purposely moved to Atlanta because she knew anyone can make noise out there. She doesn’t even rap in her own voice! Nothing about her is real, not even her ass… and she’s soft as hell. Insult her and she will create an anti-bullying campain.
That’s why the best way to go about this type of debauchery is to simply ignore it. Don’t talk about it, don’t mention it, don’t pay attention to it. Why you think all these media and hip-hop sites always keep us updated on her business? Record labels pay out the ass for that kind of PR, it’s not like they post about her because she’s super interesting and talented.
It doesn’t matter. Like jigga said “it’s only entertainment!”
Iggy deserve to be where she at as much as anyone. Vince Staples is right, and I give him props for saying something that’s unpopular to the masses. CHURCHHH
I think he is 100% right, what do we care, basketball is invented by white americans, B Real doesnt rap in his real voice, music is music, either you like it or you dont. there is no need to start inventing other not important issues to shit on peoples success
I don’t agree with you that Iggy is soft, if other rappers male/female had to face the constant name checking and twitter attacks from the black community along with hackers trying to blackmail her, many of them would fold like a cheap suit and let it interrupt their success, but Iggy a stood her grounds and fought back against Snoop/J. Cole/Banks and a gang of other people coming at her, even when some people were telling her to just take the tongue whipping from Snoop because he’s a “legend”, she stood up toe-to-toe and forced him to back down….No Iggy is no softie.
Iggy is trash on wheels; a racist at best.
> I say, “Go back to your own country making your pop music again. The last thing we want is the radio playing more white trash and making whites look bad.
Young thug doesn’t get an award. Why Iggy, then?
Young thug never calls himself the best and call people racist if they don’t like him.
Young thug never attack snoop dogg to a point where legendary music makers needed to disrespect him publicly.
Why does Iggy get to do cat-shit crazy stuff in real life and be rewarded for it?”
even Hov gets called out every once in a while so why should Iggy be treated any different? if she wants to be a rap star then she should get used to rap star treatment which is basically dudes gunning at her spot 24/7 calling her fraudulent because she is and they can.
The English language was created by the white man from Latin which was a white man created language, so anything we say or write in English is our borrowing the white man’s language to do it, to not be a culture vulture we will have to speak an African language, and rap in African tongue.
Also, we will leave telephones and planes and cars and modern drugs behind because they are white man’s created devil tools.
English is a West Germanic language, not a Latin language, although it’s significantly influenced by Latin and French (which in turn is a Vulgar Latin language).
glad someone said it that was black.. shit i mean we ALL use stuff from other cultures
check your closets and material possessions you own i guarntee more than half of your shit says MADE IN CHINA, or made in india.
black ppl use things white ppl created/invented EVERY DAY
and vice verse.
for bein so young Vince is a smart dude. Plus his music is on point. Big ups cuz
he’s right
Azalia Banks has made some good points and definitely spoke some truth to the matter but it is way bigger than iggy. What about all of these shucking and jiving rappers that continue to make hot garbage, with no substance or meaningful content??
It’s a bullshit debate anyway. The majority of people that still buy Hip Hop albums and attend shows are white.
i feel him on this. who fucking cares. she dont get play on hip-hop stations and her album still isnt gold. she sold half what j cole did
Bruthadee is that you?
Finally someone speaking a little sense. Nobody says anything when black people partake in white culture like speaking properly, getting a job, living crime free, dressing normally and having respect for women.
Really? Reread what you just posted and please tell us how speaking properly, getting a job, living crime free, dressing normally (?) and having respect for women = white culture.
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