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I am really starting to hate ego rap. You know what's worse than ego rap? Ego R&B. And you know the most overused word in ego rap and R&B? Hater.

So this is an open letter to anyone who is still using the word "hater". Knock it off. Especially if you are successful. Knock it off. It was hot for about two seconds many, many years ago. We get it, you made it. "Standing ova" to quote Jay-Z.

A part of being a celebrity is dealing with criticism. Believe it or not, you can be successful, rich and famous, and some people may not think all too highly of you. You can have all the material possessions in the world and a lot of people telling you how awesome you are, but underneath it all you're just like everyone else. Maybe you looked in the mirror one day and said "wow, I am ridiculously good-looking and talented", but some people might not hold the same opinion. They may look at you and see someone who is average in every way. And since today's media society promotes average, it's probably true. In fact, if you are average-with-a-side-of-freak and shamelessly fame-obsessed, you too might be a celebrity.

Why is it that every time a black artist wants to put whirring guitars in their song they have to go and put "rockstar" in the title? It's a trend that I have noticed for a while and I really wish it would stop. Now to be clear, by no means am I suggesting that an artist has to be confined to one genre based on the color of their skin. Anyone who knows anything about the history of rock and roll music knows that black folks have been a part of the scene since the beginning and in fact, what we call rock music today is mostly derived from jazz and blues and other historically black genres.

Music has evolved by mashing up current genres to form new ones. It took the influence of many different people from different cultures and walks of life to create the umbrella genre that we know as rock today. This process of musical cross breeding never ends and today there is pretty much a genre for every sound and every region. It's no surprise that hip-hop and R&B artists want to explore other genres because hip-hop and R&B are themselves off shoots of historical genres, including rock & roll. But when you use the word rockstar in your songs and then proceeding to parade around like you're are possessed by the spirit of Axl Rose, it is just an unbelievably lame thing to do.

NBC's Stephanie Gosk tells the story of a young teen struggling with lipodystrophy, a genetic disease that makes people look decades older than they are.

 

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