1993 SPECIAL REPORT: "GANGSTA RAP AND BLACK YOUTH"

If you love hip hop, then chances are you’re already familiar with the name Cynthia Delores Tucker. In the 90s, her crusade against what she and other voices of the Civil Rights generation as well as conservative politicians dubbed “gangsta rap,” was relentless and consequential. As a result, she earned the ire of many certified rap stars and was widely rejected from hip hop culture.

Today, that campaign still seems to be what Tucker is best known for. As I’ve come to learn more about Tucker’s life at least one thing is clear to me: although some of her actions were fairly questioned and critiqued, her overall contributions to Black freedom and consciousness movements deserve just as much space in our collective memory as her controversies.