Eminem: Stop Disrespecting This Man's Hall of Fame-Worthy Career

When it comes to the rap game, a lot has changed since the days of Pac and Biggie. Most of these young artists don’t give two squirts of piss about creating their own brand and their own sound. I try to keep up with today’s artists but there are so many 15-minutes of fame rappers who quickly fade into the background they’re almost not worth listening to since they’ll be gone tomorrow. That reason alone has made me not speak on a lot of the genre as of late. I can admit to being older and out of touch when it comes to today’s sound. However, I cannot just sit back and listen to all these people who are butthurt about Eminem being inducted into the Roll & Roll Hall of Fame.

Look, your style is your style and I’m not pushing an artist on anyone, but the claims that Eminem isn’t worthy of the Hall of Fame is just absurd. Frequent Eminem antagonist Benzino has tried to go on record saying it’s a joke and they don’t respect the culture. Now he may have a point that there are some great artists that have been overlooked such as Nas, Outkast, or Lauren Hill. Every single artist he names 100% deserves to be in.

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What they brought to the culture and sound brought passion to the game. While Eminem might not have the cultural impact on hip-hop as the others holding out the best-selling rapper of all time would be just as disrespectful. According to AllTopEverything.com, Eminem has a lead over the second-place seller (Drake) as current Hall of Fame member Tupac Shakur has sold in his entire career. As a matter of fact, while 2pac, Biggie, and Jay-z could easily be the top 3 favorite artists of all time, you’d have to add up all three’s sales to equal Eminem’s. Don’t worry, we’ll put an asterisk by that since 2 of the 3 were taken from music at the height of their careers. If they hadn’t, there’s no way they would be that far off from his numbers, but it still has to be noted.

That’s not even to say he’s better than any of those artists, that would be lunacy. But the one thing that really grinds my gears was the TikTok video a not too long ago that said “Eminem’s music was only popular for white kids to punch holes in walls at parties. No black kids were rushing out to buy an Eminem CD”(paraphrasing, content creator unknown). Look I’m sorry if you had limited exposure to his music. Let’s be honest, if that’s your stance on his career you clearly only had access to commercial Eminem.

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The one thing Em has done great over his career is market himself as a dual-personality artist. His entire career he’s pushed this idea that he’s had an alter-ego and it was Eminem vs Slim Shady. To his credit, it showed up in his music as well. Let’s be honest, Slim Shady was the wild and chaotic spotlight-stealing artist who released songs like “Just Lose It”, “The Real Slim Shady”, and “My Name Is”. Even the deeper tracks on these albums played into his antics. However, that was all for show.

Now Eminem on a track, that hit different. He’s a true lyricist that loves hip-hop and it shows. If you took a look on his features on other tracks he brought his “A-game” and often outshined those artists. He absolutely put his name on the map on Jay-Z’s “Renegade”. His bars on Drake’s “Forever” stole the show. He made 50 Cent’s “Patiently Waiting” an instant hit. Those are still just relatively commercial songs.

Dig deeper into his career with Tech N9ne’s “Speedom”. He held it down on Jadakiss’ “Welcome To D-Block”. B.o.B’s “Airplane” was already a hit without adding Em, but then they did a remix. His rhymes on Royce da 5’9’s “Catapillar” called out the weak rap game of today. And this list goes on and on of just tracks where he gets in a zone and goes off. His career goes way beyond just commercial success and his “alter-ego”.

I get it, Eminem isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. That’s just fine, but the level of disrespect out there is laughable at times. You can like artists more, there are plenty that deserve the praise. You can love the hip-hop royalty over Shady and no one will call you out for it. With that being said, anyone who doesn’t give the man his due is on some other sh–.