Voices: out of the mouths of blackness: thoughts about where we are, how we got here and where we're headed …

Ebony, July, 2007 by Adrienne P. Samuels, Shirley Henderson, Carolyn Coleman

Our music and our people have been discussed, flipped, over, examined and pulled apart.

Now, in the year following a multitude of racial debacles from Michael (Kramer) Richards' N-word tirade to Don Imus' "Nappy-headed hos" comments, it's time for us to chime in.

So, EBONY gathered a range of people who cross generations, geography and perspective to weigh-in on the debate about the use of dirty words, illicit music and self-image.

Here's what they had to say:

"I see the need, and I am committed to four things. One, we need education. We've got to start almost from scratch dealing with the development of an agreement on what respect is.

Second is mediation. What happens in a case like the Imus case, where you have someone whose language violates someone else to the extent that it creates pain and discomfort? We've got to train people as Martin Luther King Jr. did in being able to mediate the confrontations that occur to ensure that we can get past disrespect.

The third level is transformation. Both institutions and individuals will have to embrace a new behavior. Last, we need to affirm. A guy like Sinbad has had a very successful career without basing it on vulgarity and profanity. We have to affirm the people who represent what we say we believe in.

Through education, mediation, transformation and celebration, I think we can make an impact on the culture. I think it is possible to impact a culture so you have a real shift in the culture. What we have to do is develop a movement where we can be a critical difference in the culture and make a shift from disrespect being normal to disrespect being abnormal.

You can't get rid of disrespect, but you can get rid of it being normal. It's the restoration of shame. One of the things that drives older people crazy is there seems to be no shame. And where there is no shame, there's no honor. And where there is no shame or honor, you have complete social breakdown."

--The Rev. DeForest B. Soaries, Jr., pastor, 55, of the First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens in New Jersey. Soaries was the liaison between the Rutgers University women's basketball team and Don Imus.

"I think we're in danger because [there's a] lack of understanding. There's a huge sector of positive music that hasn't been given the platform to be exposed, but mainstream glorifies the majority of hip-hop music that inspires none. I believe the blatant disrespect for women is being promoted by mainstream media. I see it in beer commercials, food commercials and car commercials. I see it in film, TV and movies. I hear it in music, on radio and satellite. It's up to women and the men who have any sense to speak up and out in response to the statements that have been made and are being made."

--MC Lyte, 35, rapper, Brooklyn

"This is broken down to the basic fundamental of business ... If you do not like it, you do not have to support it."

--Daymond John, 37, founder of FUBU

"When a Black DJ gets fired for playing yet another 'bitches ain't sh--but hos and tricks' song as representation of how we feel about Black women, then I will be impressed."

--Maya Sokora, 34, artist, Dallas

"I don't want to make it like I'm doing what's right and [rappers] are doing what's wrong. There is something to be said for the incendiary nature of hip-hop music. It starts conversations and there's something to be said for the edgy nature of it ... People think that being positive is somehow easier to do or not as socially viable. I don't think that's the case. I think that each can be equally powerful, depending on the intention of the person saying it."

--India .Arie, 30, singer, Denver

"You have got to get to the root of the problem and eradicate it. The root lies in the way that this society has treated African-Americans, how Black men have been emasculated, even post-slavery."

--Q-Tip, 36, member of the hip-hop group A Tribe Called Quest

"After the dust has somewhat settled around the whole 'imess,' I think of those beautiful brown champions--the Rutgers and the Tennessee women. Who knows their names? Who is marching for their victory? We left them to fend for themselves in a hyper-sexual and hyper-violent America, as we clawed for a piece of the dream."

--Michaela Angela Davis, 43, editor-in-chief of Honey magazine

"X Clan has done conscious music from day one. We know the battle. The record industry doesn't know how to promote conscious material, and the conscience audience has turned its back on hip-hop."

--Brother J, 35, member of X-Clan, Long Beach, Calif.

"Until this culture returns to spiritual core values, proper order in the family unit and basic respect for leadership and legacy, we will continue to move in a direction detrimental to what our foreparents envisioned."

--Bishop Joseph W. Walker III, 39, founder of Mt. Zion Baptist Church in Nashville

"As opposed to art imitating life, the [music] industry sells us images that exaggerate and misrepresents who we really are as a community, as a people. Now, life is imitating art. We definitely need a balance. Hip-hop must embody the real conditions, struggles and successes of its core audience. So in the '90s, while we had A Tribe Called Quest servin' "Sex on a Platter," Public Enemy reminded us to "Fight the Power." We were open to movement as young people because the music led us that way as it told our story!"