Was there no violence in the US before Hip Hop?

The four elements promote the artistry of graffiti, breaking, MCing and Djing not guns, bitches, drugs and bling, violence only came in with the slew of Gangster shit that spread out over the past twenty years. Many artists make Hip Hop without the violent undertones they use poetry to describe a street life and ponder philosophical and moral questions, what I would say is that the people are getting more violent and disenfranchised and this is showing in the music, not the other way around

Rap music, in my perspective, is like a fantasy or a dream that the rapper themselves want ta live or just rap ta rap. There are very few rappers that actually do what they rap as far as rapping something about killing or shooting this person or smoking or drinking this. violence has always been around and officials always wanted to blame it on rap and hip hop music. Back when Tupac Shakur was here officials tried to blame his music for violence. If a person who knows good from bad chooses to do something they know will get them in trouble that's their problem that's their issue it's not rap musics fault.

Rap and Hip Hop Music are byproducts of violence. The reason for violence is socioeconomic status.

Correlation does not imply causation.

If two things happen relatively close in time and place. It does not mean they are related.

i would say it has a effect, but a relatively small one, like video games or movies, it only has a large psychological effect on the mentally unstable, besides rap and hip hop is just bad, so it should be banned anyways.

as Prayerfails pointed out, gangster rap and hip-hop with violent lyrics are a result of violence in the US.

And really, fuckin' Al and Tipper Gore with their trashing of lyrics in modern music. People don't kill because of music, people write music because of killing. What death metal song was Marquis De Sade listening to when he created sadism? What violent video games did Jack the Ripper play? And I'm really curious as to who John Dillinger's favorite rap artist was back when he killed cops and robbed banks...

People are violent because of human nature.

There is plenty of rap music that vocalizes about good causes and nonviolent things, and there is plenty of music in other genres that are as bad or worse than rap. If the issue is about the content of the song, then Rap and Hip-Hop certainly are not the only culprit. Listen to some of the rock music out there, and have you ever even heard county music? Every third song is about drinking your problems away. Music could potentially be a cause of violence, but rap certainly is not alone here.

You can't assume that just becaues people in low imcome areas who listen to rap or hip-hop that the cause is not the fact the crime rates are influeced by the music and thier message not the fact that they struggle to gather enough money to support a family or even them selves so they join violent street gangs that terrorize neighborhoods. The true reason for the Violence in the united states is the poverty of certain areas of the larger cites of this country it would be ludicrious to say thet the reason for violence is becaus of snoop dog or 50 cent or ludacris. Poverty cause the violencxe so blame it on the true source not a source that is an easy cop out so that you can claim there is nothing that can be done about it.

No. Rap music is just lyrics, however, the youth should be explained that the violence that they hear in these songs should never be emulated.