Rappers are influencing how young Christians see race

Caitlyn Kingston avoided social media after the death of Michael Brown.

Kingston, a white, 20-year-old student at Boise State University, had never heard conversations about modern racial injustice before a white cop fatally shot Brown — an unarmed, black, 18-year-old — on Aug. 9, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri. In the aftermath, Kingston heard those conversations started by some of her favorite Christian hip-hop artists.


This made her uncomfortable.

“I felt like I, as a white person, was being attacked,” Kingston said, “and I didn’t really like that.”

This past week, Kingston and several other white millennials told Rapzilla that songs and social media posts by Christian hip-hop artists since then have changed the way they see race. These testimonies come as Americans continue to grieve the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philandro Castile, two black men whose fatal shootings by police this month were videotaped and circulated online.

Following their deaths, Christian artists spoke out about racial injustice on social media and in the press. Many fans grieved with them, but others criticized them for mentioning race — a common grievance in evangelicalism.


In May, Barna Group published a study where evangelicals landed on the low end of pollers who concerned themselves with race.

“Our research confirms the fear that the church (or the people in it) may be part of the problem in the hard work of racial reconciliation,” Brooke Hempell, vice president of research at Barna, said. “If you’re a white, evangelical, Republican, you are less likely to think race is a problem, but more likely to think you are a victim of reverse racism. You are also less convinced that people of color are socially disadvantaged. Yet these same groups believe the church plays an important role in reconciliation. This dilemma demonstrates that those supposedly most equipped for reconciliation do not see the need for it.”


A 2015 study by the Public Religion Research Institute yielded similar results. Among them, 57 percent of white evangelical protestants — compared to 39 percent of Americans overall — said recent killings of black males by police were isolated incidents, rather than signs of a broader problem.

Politics play into this phenomenon, according to Dr. Todd Allen, a professor at Grove City College and Civil Rights Movement historian who has spent 20 years in higher education at Christian schools.

“I think, for some, to be Republican and to be Christian is the same thing,” Allen said, “and if you’ve got to choose one, choose Republican because we can always put Christ in your mouth. I’ve watched that repeatedly.”

When Christian artists combat racial injustice, they must also combat this culture. Potential consequences include a loss of fans and, as a result, a decline in sales. Despite this risk, numerous Christian hip-hop artists have been vocal about the killings of Sterling and Castile.


Artists lose fans over tweets like these. Fans who remain, though, can become more loyal.

“If Christian artists, especially Christian rappers, weren’t addressing race, racism, police shootings and all these things going on in America, I probably wouldn’t have given them the time of day,” Stephen Fleming, a 23-year-old from southern Maryland, said.

“I feel that I learn more from them, just through their social media and music, than I ever did in a history class in high school.”

Many hip-hop artists have lived significantly different lives than their white, suburban listeners. When artists communicate those life experiences, fans are introduced to perspectives which they would not have heard otherwise. This is the story of Fleming, as well as others like Andrew Huddleston, Ted Murphy and Melanie Pieper.

“I’ve grown up to where I didn’t see race as big of a problem as it evidently still is,” Huddleston, an 18-year-old from League City, Texas, said.

“Hearing some of my favorite artists [address racial issues] really opened up my eyes to like, ‘This is a legitimate problem whether I see it or not,’” Murphy, a 19-year-old student at Union University, said. “And hearing it from someone that I trust versus some random person in the media really makes it more personal.”

“I have been able to learn from [artists] and, as a result, have discussions on race, which I don’t think I would have ever had if I had not listened to the music,” Pieper, a 19-year-old student at the University of South Florida, tweeted. “I am grateful for the shift in perspective I have been given because of these brothers. I am trying to learn and understand so that I can encourage others to do the same. I have seen a lot of friends of mine shut down conversations on race, and it has hurt me. I have a desire to talk and learn and help in the best way I can. I don’t know how, but I am learning.”

As Pieper revealed, Christian hip-hop artists have not only educated fans about racial injustice, but they’ve also made fans care about it.

“In attending college, I’ve had discussions regarding these stories coming out, and I’ve heard students say things like, ‘Well, maybe if they had just been compliant,’” Kaitlin Ruiz, a 21-year-old student at Texas A&M University Kingsville, said, “and maybe before listening to some of these songs and hearing these experiences, I might not have had the same level of investment in these stories.”

Rebecca Fickel, a 15-year-old from Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, said seeing artists grieve on social media has helped her to sympathize with them — in a town where she said, “Race is something that a lot of people automatically assume all stereotypes are true.”

For Nathan Ake, a 17-year-old from rural North Carolina, seeing his favorite artists be vocal about racial injustice has not only given him courage to speak on it, but also taught him how to speak on it.

“You have to make sure that when you talk to somebody, you have to be open, be able to listen, try not to be condescending and try to understand their point of view,” Ake said.

Christian hip-hop artists have rapped about race throughout the history of the subgenre, but more potential exists today for them to change how evangelicals view this issue. Hip hop is more accepted by the church than it’s ever been. And instead of needing to wait for new albums to hear artists’ stances on social issues like 15 years ago, social media allows fans to see instant reactions to news.

Could this extra dose of influence from rappers be the difference in how the next generation of Christians sees race? Time will tell. But even if evangelicals aren’t immediately convinced to care about race, mere conversation — even if it ends in disagreement — is progress compared to muteness.

“I tell people when it comes to teaching, I do my best on my best days not to tell you what to think — because five years from now, I could change my mind about what I think about something — but instead to challenge you what to think about… I think that’s what artists like Lecrae are doing,” Allen said. “There’s stuff going on in the world. Think about it.”

Kingston thought about it, and of those who Rapzilla interviewed, she experienced the most dramatic shift.

“To be honest, I kind of had a hard heart toward [racial injustice] at first,” Kingston said. “I was in denial and didn’t want to hear it. When the Michael Brown shooting happened, that was my first encounter with some [artists’] feelings. I didn’t know what I felt, and I didn’t really want to hear it.”

However, killings kept occurring, and artists kept discussing them. As Kingston read her Twitter timeline following the deaths of Sterling and Castile, she felt different.

“After the last two shootings, I kept checking social media because I wanted to hear what [artists] were saying, and I wanted to know what they were feeling,” Kingston said. “Instead of feeling attacked, I was feeling helpless — like, I wanted to help them, and I didn’t know how. I noticed that change in me, and now, I just want to educate myself more on the problems so I can communicate that with other people around me.”

Education for Kingston has begun with books that Lecrae recommended earlier this month on Facebook.

“I’ve been influenced by [artists] speaking out, and I’m very grateful and thankful that they have because it’s opened my eyes,” Kingston said, “and I sincerely hope and pray that they persevere and don’t listen to those people that say they should shut up and stick to music … because this is something that needs to be talked about.”

David Daniels
David Daniels
David Daniels is a columnist at Rapzilla.com and the managing editor of LegacyDisciple.org. He has been published at Desiring God, The Gospel Coalition, Christianity Today, CCM Magazine, Bleacher Report, The Washington Times and HipHopDX.
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