Mia Carter
Carrie Hall
English 1101
May 2, 2019
                     The “Middle child” of society
It’s my first day back to college and I’m on the train to school.  I am leaning on the doors of the train as usually do. Looking at my phone as swipe throw peoples snapchats. As I swipe throw my friends post most of them are all talking about J. Cole’s new song. I am interested now wanting to know what the hype is about the new song. Suddenly, I am putting the name of the song into my search box on Apple music.  Through my headphones, I hear a males voice rapping to a nice beat. As I keep listening to the song I’m starting to like more and more. Thinking to myself J. Coles song Middle Child  is really good like I see why everyone is talking about it. As I listen to the song I thought to myself I’m happy I was being a little bit nosy because I have a new song to add to my playlist.
Cole is a rapper that always tries to talk about things that are happening now and things he deals with as a person. In the first verse of the song, cole is already talking about something big by saying “ I do not snort powder, I might take a sip I might hit the blunt, but I’m liable to trip I ain’t poppin’ no pill, but you do as you wish”. J. Cole talks about the use of drugs when being in the industry. On his 2018 album KOD, which stands for “Kids On Drugs,” Cole seems to take time to bring up the issue with people willing and supports using substance abuse in the hip-hop industry.
As we make our way throw the song Cole bring up another topic society today and the struggles “Too many ni**as in cycle of jail Spending they birthdays inside of a cell We coming from a long bloodline of trauma We raised by our mamas, Lord we gotta heal We hurting our sisters, the babies as well We killing our brothers, they poisoned the well Distorted self image, we set up to fail I’ma make sure that the real gon’ prevail, ni**a”. Cole is right there is a cycle young man going to jail coming out and going right back into a cell. Cole also touches on how these traumatic environments and events can cause long term problems for Black people making it hard. People killing each other over stupid things and women being physically and sexually abused. He also talks about the system were they always want to put people within their established stereotypes and styles. Therefore ending the real image of who we are.
J .Cole uses is music to speak about the topics people don’t really want to talk about. As other rappers talk about money, sex, drugs, and gangs. Cole talks about the uses of drugs because it needs to talked about. That the use of drugs is killing everyone and all different ages. Drugs haven’t just affected the music industry its has affected people everywhere. It has broken up families, losing family to the drugs and losing people at a young age.
Cole talks about the fact that how these traumatic environments and events can cause long term problems for Black people making it hard. People are killing each other over stupid things and women being physically and sexually abused. These are some other topics that people don’t want to talk about but they need to know. Your environment is something that affects you a lot. They shape you to the person that you will become because you don’t know anything different. Living in these traumatic environments growing up and seeing gangs, drugs, people killing each other is something you only know. People telling you-you’re not going to make it that you’re going to be like everyone you see. And this is something big on the black community that living in these types of environments you’re not going to be any different than the people you see every day. A woman being physically and sexually abuse is another thing that has affected many. Boyfriends and husbands beating on their woman as if they are a piece of property. This is something that no one should have to go throw. These are somethings people would say is mainly caused by the black community and no one wants to talk about it they just push it to the side and make the black community look bad. This is where J. Cole comes in as he knows his music reaches out to many. Therefore he could send out the message of what needs to to be said. Â
J.cole is an artist that wants a change to happen in the life we all live.  As there are many things wrongs with us we can change it. We could teach our kids what they should and shouldn’t do as the new generation, therefore, they don’t make the same mistake we already have done. To make a change for the better of the community and for you.
Work cited
https://genius.com/J-cole-middle-child-lyrics
https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jcole/middlechild.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WILNIXZr2oc
