Is hip-hop being whitewashed?

With recent Grammy wins for two different white rappers, some hip-hop fans are criticizing white rappers for what they call the cultural appropriation of a genre that developed out of black culture. For some local Long Beach hip-hop artists, respecting and acknowledging those who came before is enough to keep the culture authentic. “I don’t care who’s doing the music – whether you are white, black, beige, purple, green, whatever as long as you give credit and props to the origin of it.” And a Long Beach local addresses the question of audience diversity at Long Beach music festivals. Critics and artists discuss the trend and its history in an article on Voicewaves.