"I don't usually listen to hip-hop, but..."

One of the biggest problems I have with the predominantly white, liberal blogosphere (speaking as a white blogger, of course) is the inability of said guiltseekers to see beyond their own little world. Over at Eschaton, Holden is making a big to-do about the new Beastie Boys album. He ends his post by saying

This is the music your kids are listening too, it's a good thing.

Now I have no problem with people expanding their musical horizons. In fact, I heartily encourage it. But I have one major issue with Holden's post. Namely, that it assumes that everyone reading Eschaton, and therefore, by extension, everyone interested in left-leaning politics, is a middle aged thirtytofortysomething with a house in the `burbs, comfortably away from any societal issues that they preach about. Similarly, in comments many readers seem confused by hip-hop, made similar "oh it's crap" comments, or didn't know anything about the Beastie Boys at all. Now I'm in my late 20's. No spring chicken to be sure, but not too old, and my mother knows who the Beastie Boys are. Hell, she even saw them with me at Lollapalooza '94. This isn't meant to be one of those "my mom is cooler than your mom" things. It's merely to point out that my mother actually took an interest in my likes and dislikes and made an effort to understand them. Holden's above comment implies that most of the parents reading Eschaton don't know anything about what their kids are doing, and that's not a good thing.

My overall point? One of the largest political venues over the last twenty years has been hip-hop. From the hardlife storytelling of "The Message" to the straightforward, thought provoking politics of Public Enemy, hip-hop has been a driving force behind social change. That anyone interested in progressive politics cannot see that, or is so far entrenched in their own world that what's "it" seems weird and scary to them, speaks volumes about an internal problem with liberalism that needs to be addressed if there's any hope of enacting true change.