"Help me with this; I’m lost."
It's how New York Post columnist Phil Mushnick begins his opinion piece challenging the integrity of Chancelor Bennett, known better by his stage name, Chance the Rapper. The type of guy to add an apostrophe to the word "hood," Mushnick distastefully describes Chicago as a cesspool of black-on-black crime and makes a cringe-worthy comment about trading "R.I.P. shirts" with friends like collectibles. Not only is this comment so lacking in tact, but it trivializes those who choose to pay tribute to their deceased. Mushnick disagrees with the White Sox's recent decision to make Chance their "team ambassador," a figurehead position which seamlessly fuses the consumer bases of hip-hop and baseball.
Mushnick describes Chance as "22, unmarried with a child” as if those were his two defining characteristics. He fails to mention that Chance raised $60,000 for Chicago's homeless within a week and a half, or that his social media trend #SaveChicago led to a 42-hour period without a single shooting, or that he organizes several free events, like Teens In The Park Festival, or that he releases his music for free because many of his listeners can not afford a twenty-dollar album. Some of Mushnick's more inflammatory comments express doubt that Mayor Rahm Emanuel would "recite [Chance's] lyrics in public." This seems to exit the periphery of bigotry and enter simplistically egregious journalism. Chance won Chicago's Outstanding Youth of the Year award, an honor which Emanuel bestowed upon him personally. This is not to say that Chance agrees politically with his mayor; he has been aggressively apolitical in interviews. Still, Emanuel undeniably appreciates the positive impact Chance has had on his hometown.
Mushnick says he "spun the Google wheel" and landed on the song Smoke Again, a song that seemingly constitutes "dehumanizing gangsta rap." What he doesn't comprehend is that artists' beliefs are not represented through a single song. If he were to spin the Google wheel a couple more times, he may land on Dear Chicago Summer, or Nostalgia, or Everybody's Something, or Paranoia, an articulate commentary on (what else?) how Chicago is portrayed as a war zone. In fact, when googling "Chance the Rapper songs," Smoke Again isn't listed in the first 10 most relevant articles. It seems more likely that Mushnick, in order to form his insular opinion, searched "Chance the Rapper Smoking Weed Song" -- A pastime, by the way, in which Chance no longer engages.
Chalk it up to Mushnick attempting to be relevant, but men like him bring a sour taste to one’s mouth and a bad name to journalism. He hypocritically writes tabloid articles while upbraiding the “standard media pandering” employed by the White Sox. May this article, along with the tens of others his piece prompted, help elucidate that actions speak louder than words. Chance is striving to improve the lives of millions; he shouldn’t be brought down by old men who thrive on tendentious negativity.
