Street violence will always be a problem in cities and neighborhoods across the world, but instead of trying to tackle the real issues, far too often the people in power like to blame rap music.

During a recent appearance on The Joe Budden Podcast, Cleveland rapper Doe Boy weighed in on the age-old debate and passionately argued Hip Hop is not the reason street violence is so rampant in the hood.

“It’s real shit going on,” he said. “You gotta think, n-ggas’ friends is getting killed — this shit going on. The music just adding [to it]. That shit gonna happen anyway, that’s another thing muthafuckas gotta understand. Even with us making gangsta music, you can’t blame us because no matter what, that shit gonna go on.”

He continued, “If I stop rapping right now n-ggas still gonna kill a n-gga around the corner because he an opp, because he killed me homie or he killed my brother. You can’t blame us for that shit.”

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by No Jumper ? (@nojumper)

Doe Boy’s comments come on the heels of a debate surrounding Brooklyn drill rap’s influence on the recent string of gun violence in New York City. Last month, NYC Mayor Eric Adams called for social media platforms to ban drill music videos, whose display of guns and violence he described as “alarming.”

New York rappers Maino and Fivio Foreign took the initiative to defend the genre and met with Mayor Adams to properly discuss the issues with gun violence in the Big Apple.

“It’s been a lot of talk about drill rap, drill music in New York City, connecting violence with the culture, and I just wanted to create a conversation with the mayor,” Maino said in a clip from the meeting posted to Instagram.

“We brought Fivio here, we got young B-Lovee here, Slow and Bucks here, we got Bleezy here to talk about what’s really happening so the mayor could get a real perspective and real understanding of what drill rap is and so we could have some real dialogue and really make things happen.”