The other day, my friend and I were chatting on the steps when our eyes fixed momentarily on an attractive female classmate walking past. After a moment's pause, my friend said "Yo, for real, G, if I could do it over, I'd be a straight-up pimp in a minute." I could empathize. The pimp culture carries a powerful allure in our society. From the latest fictional playa-hero, Eddie Griffin's Undercover Brother, to "pimp tight" Playboy legend Hugh Hefner, the archetypal pimp is a fantasy figure, a living dream of success.
The pimp evolution began in 1969, when Iceberg Slim, aka Robert Beck, exposed the shadow world of professional pimps to the American public with his canonical novel, Pimp: The Story of My Life. The success of Pimp led to a new movie form in the 1970s, blaxploitation, which featured the pimp as anti-hero and inspired a generation of would-be pimps to take to the streets. Modeling themselves on popular fictional pimps with noms-de-pimp like Willie Dynamite, Goldie, Superfly, Dolemite, and Huggy Bear, thousands of young men attempted to make a living by "breaking bitches" and managing a "stable of hos."
The fictional blaxploitation pimps, usually portrayed in the movies as predatory urban black men, became both cautionary tales and enduring folk heroes. As esoteric political expressions, the pimp became either a model of upward mobility or the ultimate model of capitalist exploitation. Moralists characterized pimps as the highest expression of greed and selfish amorality. Blaxploitation movies chilled parents with their depiction of pimps holding an often cruel, seemingly mystical power over young women. Feminists criticized pimps as the embodiment of male domination and portrayed prostitutes as victims of exploitation. Young men, feeling increasingly disenfranchised by the growing feminist movement, admired pimps as models of wealth, glamour and male power.
Over thirty years since the introduction of Iceberg Slim's groundbreaking novel, the pimp image continues to grip popular American culture. In many ways, the pimp culture has crossed the threshold of societal acceptance. While caricatures like Conan O'Brien's Pimp-Bot are still recognized as blaxploitation homages, the word "pimp" is associated less with the dark realities of prostitution than with the essence of pimping: the possibilities derived from control, wealth and power. Traditional pimp vernacular, such as "game," "nigga," "bitch," "ho," "playa," "mac (-daddy)," and the ubiquitous "pimp," can be heard in everyday speech in diverse settings from inner-city barbershops to the dorms of Ivy League universities. Hip-hop, the dominant American cultural force of today, draws much of its inspiration from the pimp culture. Rappers from Too Short to Nas to Dr. Dre to Snoop Dogg to Dru Down to Ol Dirty Bastard routinely mimic the pimp image while sampling from such blaxploitation staples as "The Mack" and "Superfly."
Today, as the second generation of Americans that grew up with the pimp culture approaches adulthood, there is a growing desire to strip away the blaxploitation legacy of the 1970s to give real pimps the long overdue credit they deserve as pioneers of modern American society. Two recent movies, the 2000 Hughes Brothers' film American Pimp and the 1999 HBO Special Pimps Up Hos Down are excellent documentaries about the real-life pimp game. Presented from the pimps' point of view, the documentaries show the profession's diversity through a mixed group of famous pimps. They range from scary pimps, to pimps as outrageous as any blaxploitation character, to thoughtful pimps who portray themselves as responsible managers of professional working women. The documentaries' most memorable appearances belong to Bishop Don Magic Juan, Chicago's famed pimp-turned-preacher, pimp-turned-rapper-turned-actor Ice-T, and San Fransisco's Filmore Slim--widely considered the original godfather of the pimp game.
With feminist empowerment continuing to reshape the rules of courtship in an increasingly amoral, materialistic culture, Iceberg Slim's most enduring influence may be his theory that "some quantum of pimp in every man would perhaps enhance his approach to women." Many young American men from all backgrounds have come to share Iceberg Slim's belief. In order to avoid becoming a "simp," a man whose misguided moral behavior qualifies him only for sympathy, many men have adopted a more serious "pimposophic" outlook to life. Rapper and pimpologist Too Short explains the popular trend: "If you just can't pimp and the hos keep treating you like a simp, I don't know what to say about you boys. You better go to the store and buy some toys, cuz [sic] you can't play this game."
Eric Chen is a General Studies junior.
