Hip hop musician
Hip hop musicianiStock

A study by German researchers has found that young people are susceptible to antisemitic lyrics contained in gangsta rap, reported Deutsche Welle.

The study also found that young fans find the rappers “authentic” and are more likely to adopt their worldview.

The genre is extremely popular with German youth.

The study, conducted by researchers from the University of Bielefeld in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), called gangsta rap “the breeding ground for later entrenched antisemitic attitudes.”

"We must not stand by while musicians propagate antisemitism and indoctrinate young people with lyrics that glorify violence and are misogynistic," said NRW Antisemitism Commissioner Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, whose office commissioned the study.

Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger said that rather than banning gangsta rap, she believes that it is possible to to convince musicians, music labels and streaming platforms that they have a social responsibility not to propagate hatred in their music.

The study interviewed 500 participants between the ages of 12 and 24 from 2019 to 2021.

They discovered that participants who routinely listened to gangsta rap greatly admired rappers as authentic artists, despite most of them being “pop characters” created by marketing departments for labels and streaming services.

The researchers said that while not all lyrics were antisemitic, many of the songs were full of antisemitic conspiracy theories or stereotypes.

"Our results show that there is a direct connection between the consumption of gangsta rap and the tendency to share antisemitic and misogynistic statements," said researcher Marc Grimm of the University of Bielefeld.