Episode 6: HIP HOP’S PROMISE AND PAIN, WITH DREW DIXON
Please note: This transcript has been automatically generated.
DISCLAIMER: Hey Undistracted fam. A note about this week’s episode. we do discuss in detail issues of sexual assault and intimate partner violence. If you or anyone you know need help with this issue, you can contact the National Sexual Assault hotline at online.RAINN.org or anytime at 1-800-656-4673. There’s no shame in needing help, only strength in asking for it.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Hey y’all, as I think about it, you’ve probably heard me talk about the difference between justice and accountability quite often, especially when we’re talking about issues of police violence and brutality. That court cases that finally hold officers accountable after the harm has already been done is not the same as justice. But you know, that concept is applicable across the board. When we talk about the difference between justice and accountability, we are always naming that harm has already been done, and that there’s only so much that can be done after the fact that there’s healing that needs to take place.
BRITTANY:
That there is some kind of repair that is required for the damage, and yet the damage still exists. It’s true for the violence and empire and acts abroad. It’s true for a manager or a corporation that’s already done you wrong. And it is true for people who have been accused and are guilty of sexual abuse and assault. So many of the conversations we’re having right now are strictly about accountability, because that’s all that’s left. All that’s left is uncovering the harm that’s been done, truth and some kind of reconciliation, not between abuser and harm, but between a survivor and themselves, between a survivor and a society that continues to treat us as disposable. And yes, I said us, many of you know, I too am a survivor of sexual assault, and I count myself among far too many people who can claim the same.
BRITTANY:
The work that I’ve had to do for myself, often by myself, to repair those broken pieces in me, to let myself know that none of that was my fault. To help myself understand that even though what was done to me was not my fault, living the life I wanna live, ensuring that I thrive, well, that’s my responsibility. Not because I owe it to anybody else, but because that’s what I deserve. That takes work and care and support and community that not everyone can claim. And at the very least, accountability has to look like a society that doesn’t blame victims for their own harm and doesn’t treat us like we’re disposable, and instead builds around us the kind of safety net and support system that we need to not just survive our deepest traumas, but to thrive despite them. That’s the work. It’s not gonna be easy, but it’s absolutely necessary.
BRITTANY:
On today’s show, I sit down with Drew Dixon, an icon and music mogul, a culture maker and shaper. She was brave enough to call out her abusers. Even as hip hop trailed behind in having its Me Too moment.
DREW DIXON:
I have spent 24, 25 years hiding from my fear of this retaliation. I am not climbing back under the bed and spending the rest of my life in the fetal position. I’m gonna stand up. I’m gonna face the music, and I’m gonna stand here with my sisters and my truth and my God.
BRITTANY:
But first, the news. This week marks the seven-year anniversary of the #MeToo movement. That viral hashtag opened the floodgates for people in the entertainment industry and beyond to speak out about the abuse they had faced. But by now, hopefully we all know that the Me Too movement was founded years before by my good sis, Tarana Burke. And on morning Joe, she said this,
INTERVIEW CLIP:
People often talk about the, the men who were brought down, or the people who were called out, but they don’t think about the survivors who were finally able to release these secrets that they have been holding inside and finding each other. You know, when we say Me Too, we’re looking at another person saying, oh no, I see you. That happened to me too.
BRITTANY:
Now see, that’s why I’ve been saying that. Survivors are the story. And yet, even now, their words often come second to the focus on their abusers. That’s why I have my girl Drew Dixon on today. And we’ll get into this later in the episode. But for now, some good news. Tarana is taking Me Too worldwide with funding from the Ford Foundation. Me Too will partner with more than 130 organizations around the world with the goal of addressing sexual and gender-based violence. These are systemic problems, my friends. They know no borders and are no respecter of person, place, or position. So the more we can connect, the stronger we’ll be in finding solidarity and fighting back. Now, y’all know I love to talk about the intersection of identity and politics, which to be clear is not the same thing as identity politics, which has a specific definition from the Black feminists of the Combahee River Collective.
BRITTANY:
And I urge y’all to go read that definition. ’cause the internet talks about it all wrong. Anyway, Let me tell you about the story that really stuck out to me this week. The New York Times released some new polling data that shows something interesting happening, specifically among Black and Latino men. For Black voters, there are folks who think the Democratic Party is not so great at keeping its promises. And so Black voters are moving away from the Democratic party and not really toward President Trump. And for Latino men, there was actually more of a pull toward Trump. I gotta understand it. So let’s talk about it. I mean, first, I wanna name very clearly that the majority of Black men and Latino men do not vote against their own interests or the interest of their community.
BRITTANY:
And we shouldn’t be talking about this, like there are some kind of inherent flaw in Black and Latino men. But it is interesting to say the least. It’s something that we should dig under. We, of course, have to consider that the radicalization that has been targeting young men of all stripes on places like YouTube and Discord and others, has also affected young men of color. We know that misogyny intersects with race all the time, and that toxic masculinity can perform in any color. But we also have to say this, it’s time for the Democratic Party to stop viewing Black and Latino voters as a monolith and to never take our votes for granted. I think it was really important that Vice President Kamala Harris spoke to Charlemagne just the other day and said, Hey, I’m trying to earn everybody’s vote.
BRITTANY:
And in that conversation that included Black men, not just in terms of messaging, but in terms of policy. Every single group of people deserves to have that kind of attention paid to it. Now, that doesn’t mean the folks should go out there and vote for Donald Trump. Please, God, don’t ever think that I’m saying that. But it is to say, the more radically inclusive our politics are, well, the further we can get. And as communities deal with the fallout of not one, but two major disasters. First, hurricane Helene, and now Hurricane Milton. There’s another crisis happening. The crisis of conspiracy theories running rampant online with fuel from right wing leaders.
NEWS CLIP:
I saw this post on X, it’s by Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green. She’s talking about the recent hurricanes. She says, yes, they can control the weather. It’s ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can’t be done.
BRITTANY:
*sigh* During a recent rally, president Trump falsely said that disaster funds were being, quote, diverted to migrants in the US quote, illegally. So these false claims and conspiracies have gone viral on TikTok and other social media platforms and staff from the Federal Disaster Agency, like the people actually on the front lines of helping communities recover. They’ve been facing death threats as a result. Y’all, this is wild. There’s no reason why people should be talked out of getting the money that is due them to survive. Real quick, let’s have a moment of understanding. Climate change is a thousand percent real, and it’s impacting all of us no matter where we live. It’s scary and it’s overwhelming, to say the very least. So I have compassion for everyday people who may be turning to false realities and conspiracies because they’re simply looking for a way to cope. But y’all taking advantage of people who are in the most desperate circumstances is the most disgusting shit I’ve ever seen. So let’s turn our focus to be firmly planted in helping communities recover and to thinking through how the hell we are going to adapt and survive future disasters. ’cause that’s what’s gotta be on our minds. We’ll be right back.
AD BREAK
BRITTANY:
We are back, y’all. In the wake of the #MeToo anniversary. And as the Diddy case continues to make headlines, I wanna refocus the conversation. This is ndistracted. After all on the people who have spoken out and spoken up. That’s why I brought my friend Drew Dixon to the conversation today. We’ll get into her story, the headlines, and how she’s thinking about the future of hip hop. Hi, my friend. Welcome to Undistracted. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for doing this.
DREW DIXON:
Thank you for having me. Thank you for everything you do.
BRITTANY:
When I finally got to meet you that time in person, I think I was floored by just how generous your spirit is. I mean, you’re really a force in so many ways. Creatively, obviously a force for justice. You’re not just a survivor, but you’re a fighter and you’re a visionary. And I don’t want people to miss that. I just really don’t want people to miss that. I don’t want you to ever miss it. Let’s settle in a little bit. ’cause I really, I need the people to understand who the hell they talking to. Okay? Okay. <laugh>, we gonna go there? Okay. So we have Drew Dixon, a Stanford graduate, a Harvard Business School alum. You are head of A & R at Def Jam Records in the mid nineties.
DREW DIXON:
Not head. I was, I was director.
BRITTANY:
Okay. <laugh>, keep me straight. Okay. Don’t get me the lying. But your ear really helped shape hip hop and r&b, especially in this, this moment when it started to become more mainstream. Right? Like, we don’t get American Boy without you for Estelle. We don’t get Whitney’s My love is your love, a little Bobby, Christina. God rest both of their souls in the background. We don’t get Maria Maria, we don’t get the iconic, I’ll be there for you all I need method man and Mary J. Blige remix that defined a generation. Like when you talk about your contributions to the culture, I wanna be clear you are the culture.
DREW DIXON:
First of all, thank you. Thank you for being you. Thank you for inspiring me. Thank you for reminding me of the value I add, that I hope to add in the culture.
BRITTANY:
I said in my season opener a couple of weeks ago, what I’ll say again, the abusers keep making headlines, but we need to hear from the survivors. Right? That’s right. All this shit is systemic, which is why I wanted to have this conversation. We had some of those conversations about rape culture when, you know, #MeToo hit Hollywood very hard. But the music industry is kind of lagging. That’s right. So when you came forward, you were one of the first to speak out about the abuse and harassment that you faced in the music industry. And to be very clear, you not only told your story, but you named your abusers both incredibly powerful men in the industry. Which really, really, really just makes me wanna start by asking like, how are you doing? I mean, really, how are you doing?
DREW DIXON:
Oh, well, and thank you for asking how I’m doing. It’s heavy. Mm-Hmm. . It’s a heavy time. It’s, um, it’s an unnerving time. Mm. Because it feels kind of like this massive tectonic plate just shifted in the culture. And it’s not exactly clear what’s coming next, where the mudslides are gonna be, where the floods and the fires are gonna come from, because it does feel like this really epic moment.
BRITTANY:
Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
And so how am I doing? I mean, you know, one of the things that happens whenever there’s sort of a big story in the news about an abuser in particular, an abuser in the music industry, my dms light up with people who suddenly find the courage to speak out. And a lot of them stop in my dms first to find out what to do and where to go. It’s a lot to carry. I don’t have any expertise in this area. I don’t have support. I don’t have an organization, I don’t have anything but just me and my phone. And I try my best to make sure the person feels seen and heard. And then I try my best to try to find resources to refer, um, them too, or people to connect them with. But it’s a lot to carry because I’m hearing these stories. So I’m hanging in there <laugh>. I’m blessed. Grateful. I’m, I’m, I’m okay.
BRITTANY:
You know, um, I imagine that holding all of those things, the personal, the political, what belongs to you individually, what belongs to you as a, as a mother, and also then holding the stories and the, gosh, the, the most intimate details of, in a lot of cases, perfect strangers who look at you and find the only safety that they’ve seen. That is no slight task. Like that is no small calling. Um, what, what promise did you hear in hip hop that made you wanna be a part of it, that made you wanna help shape it?
DREW DIXON:
So, you know, when I was at Stanford, I took a class. It was really a “swapsy” Stanford workshop on political and social issues. And we, like, looked at the big isms, racism, sexism, nationalism. And I had just come back from doing a semester at Howard where I had really, like my mother had just become the mayor of dc. I’d worked on her campaign and I’d really fallen in love with hip hop down in DC. You know, I loved the kinda sort of righteous Afrocentric artists like Brand Nubianand the kind of brainy, tribe De La Soul artist. But I was also in California, so I was listening to NWA and America’s Most Wanted by Ice Cube. And so taking this class, listening to hip hop felt to me connected. And I remember saying in the class that I wanted to find a way in my life to look at all these isms and the way they were interconnected and enabled each other and just whack at ’em for the rest of my life. Let me find a way to just swing at that monolith of oppression, and hopefully I can just make a dent, you know, before I have to put my hammer on the ground. You know? And I really truly feel that. And I felt that. And to me, hip hop seemed like a way to do that. I always loved music. I was always the kid with a mix tape with everything from like The Smiths to the The Go-Gos to Billie Holiday, to like Doug E. Fresh.
BRITTANY:
This is why you and me, this is why we’re sisters. Because <laugh>, the eclectic taste is like the only way to live.
DREW DIXON:
It was like rare essence, Echo & the Bunnymen. <laugh> what? Duke Ellington. And my musical taste was always like eclectic and like 18 months ahead of the curve. Mm-Hmm. . And I found out that A & R was this job for people who are ahead of the curve. And I thought, okay, I love music. I have an ear for what’s going to be hot. Yeah. And I do believe that hip hop is this unique genre where the microphone is in the hands of these young, brilliant, largely Black people, Black and brown people. Mm-Hmm. telling stories and talking about experiences that are important to shift the culture and hopefully to attack some of these isms and, and make this world more just. And I decided that’s what I’m gonna do with my life. So I got an internship at Jive Records, and I remember my mom saying, that company is jive. They don’t even pay you <laugh>.
BRITTANY:
I was gonna say, I’m like, you did your, did your family actually understand this choice.
DREW DIXON:
<laugh>? No. Oh no. I felt like hip hop is a way to, it’s just a path of liberation. And you know, I knew that when we first got here in 1619, one of the first things they did is they took our drums away. Mm mm-Hmm. because they knew that Black music was a path and a tool of resistance and liberation. And so I saw this through line from our drums in 1619 to them turntables. Yeah. In 1992. And I wanted to pick that up and see what I could do and try to make a difference.
BRITTANY:
You said before that you felt like the, the promise that you saw in that through line, in that thread included a real partnership between women and men. Do you feel like you witnessed a moment, perhaps it was as hip hop became more commercialized, where that misogyny started to not just creep in, but become more prominent?
DREW DIXON:
I think it was always there. Mm-Hmm. . I don’t think that we as a people have ever healed from the institution of slavery. Mm. And from the very deliberate breakdown of the relationship of support that should exist between men and women. In the documentary, on the record, I talk about my visit to Ghana and the slave castle, where there is a condemned cell where the Black men who defended the Black girls, ’cause they weren’t really women, the average age of the enslaved Black women was 15. So they were girls. All of them were routinely raped. That was a process. It was a part of the business of being a slave traitor, and ultimately a slave owner. Um, the Black men who defended the Black women and girls were taken into a cell and left there to die. Hmm. So the breakdown of the relationship between Black men and women was destroyed deliberately. And we haven’t healed from that. Yeah. We’ve never healed from that. And unfortunately, I think it’s always been sort of baked into hip hop culture. I think I just was trauma bonded to hip hop and trauma bonded to toxic patriarchy as a Black woman in America who loves my Black men and my Black boys and brothers and cousins, and you know, I overlooked the toxic nature of these relationships in my life and in hip hop.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. I, I think people miss that part so much that it hurts the way that it does. Not just because the harm is intentional, but because we love our brothers. We, we love our sons. We do, we love our fathers
DREW DIXON:
deeply,
BRITTANY:
our uncles, our cousins. Deeply. That’s right.
DREW DIXON:
And you wanna protect them.
BRITTANY:
That’s right. And then when we don’t receive that protection back, that is a, that is a, a, a chasm that is difficult to repair. Right.
DREW DIXON:
It is, it’s deep.
BRITTANY:
Um, it is deep. And I, and I think often also about how much genius we’ve missed out on. That’s right. Because abusers have altered so many people’s trajectories. Yeah. Right. I mean, people talk about how, you know, Diddy’s career has forever changed. And I’m like, what about Cassie’s career?What about all of the folks that ever interacted and worked with him that are forever changed and whose genius we never saw. Right. Whose safety was never fully realized. Um, years ago, you really triumphantly created the space to tell your own story about assaults by, I’m gonna name them, Def Jam, co-founder Russell Simmons and LA Reid um, who, you know, growing up these names were larger than life for so many of us. Right? Yeah. Um, what made you decide to tell your story and take it all the way to a place of, you know, a full length Hollywood documentary in On the Record?
DREW DIXON:
Well, the documentary, I mean, that happened really kind of just almost like by accident. But I, you know, my decision to come forward was also kind of by accident in the sense that I, when I first heard the Me Too movement sort of beginning in its incarnation, and when I’m saying the Me Too movement, I sort of mean the #MeToo movement where people came forward and named powerful men and put themselves on the line in that way. When that began in October of 2017, I remember I was driving my daughter back and forth almost every day at a dance theater in Harlem where she was dancing and hearing it on like the radio.
BRITTANY:
Right? Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
And thinking, well, this is amazing. I can’t believe these women are being believed. This is great, they’re also white, they’re also movie stars. And so this is wonderful and good for them. And also, this has nothing to do with me. This is not for us. This isn’t, I don’t see this extending to Black women, you know, white women at least start out on a pedestal. Right. And, and, and it’s, it’s, it’s a gilded cage and it’s complicated and it’s fraught with, you know, layers of oppression. But at least they started on a pedestal. We start out on an auction block, like we don’t even start there.
BRITTANY:
Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
So there’s no expectation of safety for us by this point in my life, I was, you know, old enough to know better than to think that what was happening to these white women who were being believed would translate for me and for us.
DREW DIXON:
And then Brett Ratner was named, the director, in the Me Too movement. And Brett Ratner, I knew fairly well because he was around Def Jam all the time. He was very close to Russell Simmons. And then I started to get nervous that Russell’s name might come up.
BRITTANY:
Mm.
DREW DIXON:
It was getting really close to home. It was getting close at the time. I didn’t know of anyone else who’d been abused by Russell. I, you know, always wondered for 24 years why he did that to me. Um, but given the fact that he’d done that to me, I thought it was likely that his name would come up having been inappropriate in some way with somebody else. And I wondered what I would do if that happened. And I decided I wouldn’t do anything. I would just keep my head down. I was trying to start a company at the time, it was hard enough as a Black woman trying to raise money.
DREW DIXON:
I didn’t want to be toxic. Yeah. And so I, you know, was kind of holding my breath. And then two women came forward and accused Russell of assault and in one case, rape. And then I kind of, again, did some soul searching and decided for myself and my kids and my family that I wouldn’t do it. And then he called them liars and that did it. Yeah. Called them liars. And I happened to be at an event for my kid’s school talking to a mom there about that. And in my mind, she was just like my daughter’s friend’s mom. She also happens to be a documentary filmmaker, married to a documentary filmmaker. Hmm. Um, and when I told her my story, she mentioned that she knew Jodi Cantor at the New York Times and asked me if I wanted to be introduced. And I, I said, no.
DREW DIXON:
And then I thought about it and I read his statement and I was so offended by it because he said he was incapable of violence, and my experience with him was violent. It was like a fight that I lost. And so then I decided to go into the New York Times off the record, and then they told me they’d spoken to three more victims. Yeah. And I asked, are any of them Black? Because I’m not gonna be out here. The only Black woman taking down the king hip hop
BRITTANY:
By yourself. Yeah.
DREW DIXON:
Not doing that. And they said that some of the victims were Black, and that it would be more powerful if I included my name in the story because they wanted to talk about my career, and that it would give context to my experience. And that’s when I decided reluctantly to let them use my name. And because I’d met them through these documentary filmmakers, my experience of going to New York Times was filmed, and my experience of coming forward was filmed as part of what was supposed to be like a Me Too documentary, where I was gonna be like five minutes. And then it shifted to become this film that centered my story. And even there, I didn’t sign the release to appear in that film for 15 months of them filming me, cause I am a Black woman and understand the way the false narrative of violent hypersexual Black men is used to lynch innocent Black men. It was used against the central, the exonerated five.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. The Central Park five.
DREW DIXON:
That’s right. And I was like, I’m not giving you guys that ammo. I’m not giving you a whole entire movie that’s gonna hurt innocent Black men and boys. I’m not doing that. And so they inquired more into that double bind as they called it, and interviewed people who could speak to that with real sort of intellectual heft and expertise. And that’s when I decided, okay, I will go ahead and do this thing. And that’s really how it all happened. It was not something I ever sought out at all.
BRITTANY:
Yeah, I mean, your, your clarity about how much you needed to exercise your agency in all of this, I think is such an important note to make sure that we don’t miss. Because this is the complex nature of being a Black survivor, a Black woman survivor, a survivor of color. I’m also thinking about our conversations on undistracted with Professor Anita Hill. And thinking about how now Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings weaponized that same imagery, and called her very credible accusations of sexual harassment against him, a quote, high tech lynching.
DREW DIXON:
That’s right.
BRITTANY:
Right. That he knew the way to defend himself was to call back in that image of him being attacked as a Black man. and so you, you were carrying all of that while also carrying your own story. So you are anticipating these consequences. You’re anticipating this backlash.
DREW DIXON:
Mm-Hmm.
BRITTANY:
If you are open to sharing,I wanna know the worst of it but i also wanna know the best act of coming forward, I wanna know the best that came from you deciding to say, enough is enough. I’m gonna speak up.
DREW DIXON:
I found myself. I have spent 24, 25 by then, I’m not sure of the math years hiding from my fear of this retaliation. I am not climbing back under the bed and spending the rest of my life in the fetal position. I’m gonna stand up. I’m gonna face the music, and I’m gonna stand here with my sisters and my truth and my God.
BRITTANY:
Do you feel like you found any freedom in that?
DREW DIXON:
I found the strength to fight for the Adult survivors Act.
BRITTANY:
Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
I found the strength to help push that over the finish line. I found the strength to give the keynote when the governor signed the Adult Survivors act into law. I found the strength to advise other survivors about how to use the Adult Survivors Act. I found the strength to file my own lawsuit under the Adult Survivors Act. So yeah. It set me free. It set me free. I’m a child of God in the world with my truth. Come at me. Don’t actually <laugh>, but don’t come at me,
BRITTANY:
But I’m, you said, but I’m ready for whatever. I’m ready because I got God on my side. I know that’s right.
DREW DIXON:
Okay. God, on my side, my ancestors on my side, them 15-year-old girls who are my ancestors on my side. Yeah. You know, and the truth.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. It’s so interesting to hear you talk about the anticipated consequences, even as you talk simultaneously about your privileges. And yet you were still not, and I hate this term, but we know what we’re talking about, you were still not the quote unquote perfect victim. Right. That none of those privileges inoculated you from, from the consequences that Black women in particular face so harshly. Why all the nitpicking? Like why is beliefs survivors so much easier said than done for so many people?
DREW DIXON:
Mm-Hmm. Well, believing survivors comes with responsibility. I mean, there’s a burden you pick up. Um, because what are the implications of believing survivors? You have to deal with the abusers then. You have to deal with the scaffolding that supports the abusers, and perhaps you benefit from that scaffolding. Perhaps you’re an enabler of that scaffolding. And so if you believe survivors, then you have to do the work when it comes to toxic, abusive people in it. Let’s rip it down to the studs and build something better holding onto all the good stuff. Yeah. We don’t have to throw out the baby with the bath water. We can hold the baby under one arm and clean out that tub. Yeah. Let’s do it. Yeah. But that work, what do you do once you face it? Then you, then there’s, you have to do something.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. I think so much of dealing with it, um, in the context of raising my son, because I know that it is both my and my husband’s job to do our level best to raise him to understand that he has no right or entitlement to somebody else’s body, to somebody else’s agency, to their autonomy. And I keep asking myself, what is going to take for the responsibility to stop sexual assault, to be placed on the correct actors.
DREW DIXON:
Right. Right. On the, on the men and the boys and the perpetrators. And they’re not always men and boys, to be clear…
BRITTANY:
Nope. They’re not. And on the system of, of, of patriarchy. Right. That creates culture such that many men are socialized to believe that they can just take what they want.
DREW DIXON:
Well, we live in a rapacious culture. I mean, look what we’re doing to the earth <laugh>.
BRITTANY:
That’s right.
DREW DIXON:
It’s a rapacious culture. You know, it’s, it’s, capitalism is rapacious. It will consume and consume and consume and increase that delta between costs and, you know, profit margins. And that means there are winners and losers. Yeah. It is built for there to be winners and losers. It’s a model. It’s a mental model that is baked into our culture now on every level. And it is destructive. It is incumbent upon us to think about a whole different way of being and showing up in the world.
BRITTANY:
I’m curious to know if you feel like any of it has changed for the better. You said back in the nineties that the cavalry did not come to help you. Right. Did not come to support you.
DREW DIXON:
Well, the cavalry didn’t come in the Me Too movement. Yeah. That’s what I meant. It didn’t come when I came forward.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. Do you feel like it’s changed, and that more Black men in particular are beginning to support Black women survivors? Has the cavalry come?
DREW DIXON:
The cavalry is you and me and all the survivors. We are the cavalry. That’s the cavalry I found. Hmm. I’ll be honest with you. We are our own cavalry. And it’s a damn shame. But I’m being honest, that’s the cavalry I found. The cavalry of my sisters and male survivors, I don’t know ever wanna leave ’em out Survivors of all gender identities.
BRITTANY:
That’s right. That’s right.
DREW:
It’s the cavalry of survivors. Yeah.
DREW DIXON:
We are the ones saving ourselves and saving each other and lifting each other up. I spoke to a survivor recently who reached out to me, like just last week, who told me a horrific story of being assaulted by someone on a tour bus. Hmm. And she found herself in a city having to run off of this tour bus without her license and her purse and her money or anything. And she ended up walking into a hotel and she was frantic and she was fighting back tears, and she didn’t know what to do, and she had to get to the city where she’d left her luggage and figure out how to get home. And it was a Black woman behind the counter Mm. Who was like, what’s going on? And she kind of, she never said what was going on, but she could kind of tell Mm-Hmm. . And she said, I’ll drive you.
BRITTANY:
Mm.
DREW DIXON:
And she drove her hours to her hotel so she could get her stuff and go home.
BRITTANY:
Wow.
DREW DIXON:
That’s the cavalry.
BRITTANY:
That’s the cavalry. It matters that there’s a calvary. Right. Yeah. Because you, you recently spoke to the New York Times in particular about the news of the day, about the growing and ever expanding case against, uh, Diddy, against Sean Combs. Um, for years of abuse and assault. Um, and you said quote, you’re not just going up against the person who assaulted you, you’re going against everyone who benefits from their brand and revenue stream. Right. Because that’s their cavalry. How would you describe that kind of constellation that allows sexual violence to operate at that systemic level? Right. And that can protect an abuser for so long.
DREW DIXON:
Well, I mean, you need the system. I mean, none of these people can hunt and harm and prey on victims for decades without a system that supports them. And, um, without mentors and proteges and companies and, you know, handlers and the legitimacy of their sort of ostensible purpose and their ostensible role in society and in the industry, which is the bait.
DREW DIXON:
And it’s also the punishment, you know? It’s, it’s, it’s the, it’s the carrot and the stick, right? And, um, yeah. I mean, I don’t know if that’s the question, but I mean, it’s, it’s how they get away with it for so long. Somehow or another, the industry choked out the people who were there for all the right reasons. And as a result, the people who have survived are the people who are giving us music that reflects their values or lack of values. We now have Black music that glorifies wealth and misogyny and materialism over all other things. We haven’t gotten another Lauryn Hill album so my daughter loves Taylor Swift and Billie Eilish, and they’re cool.
BRITTANY:
Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
But you can’t tell me there’s no Lauryn Hill walking around out there, or no Nina Simone. But if the gatekeepers are toxic misogynists, they’re not gonna make The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. They’re not gonna empower the next Nina Simone. So there’s this poverty for us as a culture now. You know, Black music, I mentioned this before, has been a path to liberation for us from the beginning.
BRITTANY:
Mm-Hmm.
DREW DIXON:
And so when the Black music is being made by gatekeepers that hate women, that love money, that perpetrate violence, what does that mean for us as a society? What does that mean for us as a culture? So the enabling of the abuse isn’t just hurting the victims, it isn’t just driving out people who could also have had successful careers in the industry. Yeah. It’s reshaping the soundtrack of our lives in the image of the worst possible role models. Mm. This is a crisis for us as a people. Yeah. As a culture. It’s not about me, it’s not about any one victim, it’s not about anyone abuser. It’s about all of us.
BRITTANY:
Yeah. You talked earlier about the Adult Survivors Act because this simultaneously is cultural and legal. You’ve advocated for it. And also that this, um, law was temporary. Right.
DREW DIXON:
One year
BRITTANY:
Help us understand exactly what the Adult Survivors Act is…was, and really why that should be the law of the land everywhere. ‘Cause frankly, I don’t understand why it’s not.
DREW DIXON:
Yeah exactly. It should be. And there is…. I actually had the honor of giving an award a couple nights ago to E. Jean Carroll.
BRITTANY:
I saw that.
DREW DIXON:
And she filed her lawsuit under the Adult Survivor’s Act the day the window opened. And she and I were talking about the need to make it permanent, so there is a movement to make it permanent. Um, the Adult Survivor’s Act was modeled on the Child Victims Act. The Child Victims Act opened a window, a one year look back window. I believe it was one year for survivors who were under 18 at the time, they were harmed in the state of New York to bring civil suits. And then the Adult Survivors Act was the exact same law, took longer to pass. Um, and it was 18 and over. Mm-Hmm. And the reason I think it’s important is that trauma takes time. Mm. It takes time to heal. It takes time to literally logistically position yourself outside of the realm of the abuser’s sphere of influence, which may mean you’ve gotta move to another city or move to another industry, or find another job.
DREW DIXON:
All of those things take time. That, that can take years to even be in a place where you can face your abuser. You first have to heal to be strong enough to face your abuser. And by the time you do all that, you are often outside of the statute of limitations to bring a criminal claim. And so the Adult Survivors Act made it possible to bring a civil suit. And unfortunately, that means the only recourse is some form of remuneration. Right. People say these are money grabs, but that’s the only thing available is some sort of compensation or some sort of recognition, um, that’s meant to make the victim and the survivor whole. Um, and I always say I’m a victim and a survivor. We will always be both, holding space for the broken part and not discarding that part of who I am.
DREW DIXON:
Um, and so the Adult Survivors Act for me was important because I understand that trauma takes time. And I also felt that there were a couple of things that really moved me to decide to push really hard for that. The younger victims who are in the criminal statute, in some cases are not far enough away from the abuse. They’re not safe enough. They’re not on the other side, maybe of their careers. They haven’t maybe come to terms with the fact that their careers will never bounce back or they don’t wanna come forward ’cause they don’t wanna be derailed. And so the weight of coming forward before the Adult Survivors Act was sort of falling on the shoulders of the younger victims. And in fact, there was tension behind the scenes between some victims my age who were frustrated with younger victims who could have brought criminal charges if they would just pick up the phone and file a police report.
DREW DIXON:
Because some of the older victims wanted them to do that because there were, there was nothing we could do. And I thought, well, this is a lot of weight to put on the shoulders of somebody in their twenties. Right. The Adult Survivors Act switched the paradigm and made it possible for any of us to come forward, including those of us who were much older and at different stages in our lives. That’s more appropriate to put the weight on our shoulders, not on the shoulders of the younger victims. Another reason I felt strongly about fighting for the Adult Survivors Act is that it moved the conversation out of the sphere of the media. Mm. mm-Hmm. Yeah. And or social media where some people were telling their stories inspired by the Me Too movement into the more rigorous environment of a legal proceeding.
DREW DIXON:
Yeah. And so if your complaint could withstand a motion to dismiss or even withstand the scrutiny of an attorney who has to make a decision to take you on as a client Mm-Hmm. , and then articulate your abuse in the form of a formal legal complaint filed in the Southern District of New York, it would bring a level of gravitas to these accounts that moved them out of the sphere of salacious headlines, which was super important as a reckoning in 2017, 2018, sort of the peak of the Me Too movement and move it into a more sort of rigorous environment. Yeah. And frankly, by filing her lawsuit in the Southern District of New York, Cassie triggered this scrutiny of her allegations in the formal setting of a legal proceeding that seems to have been the catalyst for now more lawsuits to come forward and criminal prosecution. Right. And so to me, we deserve that as survivors, and we deserve that as a society, as a culture. To move this out of the realm of he said, she said, or he said, he said, and headlines into something more substantive where accountability can happen and hopefully healing can happen and pressure can be put on these industries to build something better and more worthy of all of us.
BRITTANY:
Before I let you go, I wanna ask you about what that better is. Because, you know, I started off asking you about the hope and the promise of this young genre called hip hop. Right. That, that in the nineties when you, um, started to encounter it. Right. It was an adolescent, it was a teenager. Hip hop is good and grown. Now we saw all the 50th anniversary celebrations. Hip hop is good and grown. Right. So briefly, where would you like to see it go in the next 10 years?
DREW DIXON:
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the most uplifting, successful hip hop album of the last 10 years broke on Broadway, Hamilton. That kind of uplifting, innovative hip hop Hmm. I don’t think it can be made in that old system with those toxic people and their enablers. Hmm. So I believe we have to find another path, not just Broadway, Go Lin-Manuel Miranda, but maybe investors in companies run by people who aren’t toxic, but who can hear, who can make hits, who can make the next Nina Simone record on somebody Black and young and dope, who can make a hip hop love song for 2025. We need people who care to fund ’cause we are living in the capitalist world still.
BRITTANY:
Yeah.
DREW DIXON:
To make a way for artists and records that are righteous and bops.
BRITTANY:
Yeah.
DREW DIXON:
Outside of that old, decrepit, toxic system where they hurt people.
BRITTANY:
I also think it’s not, um, it’s not a coincidence that the very, very best and finally being recognized hip hop music being put out right now is being put out by women. Mm. Right. I mean, Rhapsody’s new album is fantastic, right? Yeah. Doechii just came with the heat. Right. Right. There is something breaking to your point that is saying the old system very simply does not work for us.
DREW DIXON:
Doesn’t work. Hip hop started out in the heart and everybody’s trying to chart. Right. Yeah. Let’s get back to that.
BRITTANY:
Let’s get back to it. Shout out to Lauryn Hill for that part. Right. <laugh> and shout out to you Drew Dixon for keeping us on the righteous path. You are just such a special human being and I’m so, so glad that we got the chance to learn from you.
DREW DIXON:
I feel the same way. I’m so grateful for you.
BRITTANY:
Thank you my friend. Like Drew, may each of us find the strength to tell the truth even when our voice shakes. That’s it for today, but never for tomorrow.
CREDITS:
Undistracted is a production of the media and our friends at Wonder Media Network. Our producers are Taylor Williamson, Hannah Bottum, and Vanessa Handy. Our editors are Grace Lynch and Maddy Foley. Thanks also to Natalia Ramirez and Sarah Culley. Our executive producers at The Meteor are Cindi Leive and myself. Our executive producer at Wonder Media Network is Jenny Kaplan. You can follow me at Miss Pack Yeti on all social media and our incredible team at the Meteor. Subscribe to Undistracted and don’t forget to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any place you get your favorite podcasts. Thanks for listening. Thanks for being, and thanks always for doing. I’m Brittany Packnett Cunningham. Let’s go get free.