I was recently quite disturbed by this story of a couple in Toronto who have refused to divulge the gender of their recently born child, who they named Storm (how perfectly gender ambiguous!). Though Storm does indeed have a gender, Storm’s parents–Kathy Witterick and David Stocker–aren’t telling anyone, not even family and close friends, what it is.

“We’ve decided not to share Storm’s sex for now–a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation,” wrote Witterick in an email. “In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, ‘Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s (he) wants to be?!.”

Jay Z and 50 face off after the Kanye fall out continues. Jay Z makes the comment that if 50 was stage when Kanye came up he still would’ve did the same thing because “Ain’t no one scared of 50.” This of course started a whole “battle of words” between the two artists. 50 couldn’t just sit and let Jay Z talk about him, right? 50 had to get back and protect his name, right? Or was it deeper than that? Is a man’s name all he really has? You can read that article here.

What is even more an issue here is the hyper male posturing that continues to dominate Hip Hop, but even more, give young males the idea that to “be a man” you need to call someone out. Manhood representations in Hip Hop are looked at in one of several ways:

• Representing
• Maintaining your own
• Power
• “Providing” for your woman
• Being tough
• Avoiding face loss