Sunday, September 10, 2006

The Diddy Men

I see Sean Combs, aka Puff Daddy aka whatever else he feels like that week, has been prevented from yet another rebranding exercise recently. An obscure British DJ noticed that Combs was about to take his own stage name. He threatened the American millionaire with court, winning exclusive rights to the alias and his legal costs in the bargain.
An uplifting story, until you see the name they were disputing. Diddy. I mean, Diddy? A name which, unless I'm mistaken, was first coined by everyone's favourite wacky tax evader Ken Dodd. Is this what rap, a genre which once gave us magnificient creations like Queen Latifa, Niggers With Attitude and Grandmaster Flash, has sunk to? Or has this unsettling undercurrent always run through it? Perhaps the cataclysmic East-West rivalry between Tupac Shakur and The Notorious BIG in the 1990's was really over who had the right to change their name to Flopsy-Wopsy.
Name calling has always between an important part of rap. But for God's sake, boys, stick to calling one another hoes and muthafuckas. It's far more dignified.

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