During the month of November, the University of Oregon Duck Nest Wellness Center is putting on weekly workshops that pertain to men’s health issues. The initiative is known as “movember” — 30 days when men do not shave in order to raise awareness for mental and physical health.  

On Tuesday, Nov. 6, students and staff piled into the Duck Nest with pens and notebooks as they awaited the “movember”-themed workshop to begin. The topic for week one: toxic masculinity and the four elements of hip-hop.

The instructor of the class, Bryan Rojas-Arauz, is a fourth-year doctoral student and the education and prevention outreach specialist for the University of Oregon’s counseling center.

Rojas-Arauz said that his upbringing in the Bay Area inspired his love for music. As he got older, he got a job as a counselling intern and began mentoring inner-city kids. Rojas-Arauz found the one thing they connected over was hip-hop.

Rojas-Arauz wanted to reach out to UO students in the same way.

He began the class by connecting the four elements of hip-hop: graffiti, b-boying (breakdancing), emceeing and deejaying, with the four ways in which music tells men they must behave.

Graffiti represents the tough physical images in music that men are told they must portray. B-boying signals the actions they must abide by. Emceeing represents the toxic words they hear and deejaying represents the unspoken rules that come with “being a man.”

Rojas-Arauz wants students to realize that they do not have to conform to the toxic ideals portrayed in hip-hop. “I want to increase critical consciousness and get people to think about what it is they consume and how they relate to music,” he said.

Third-year student Ozzy Martinez entered the Duck Nest with curiosity and an open mind. He asked to leave work early so he could attend the workshop and learn more about the music he grew up loving.

“I realized that it’s good to be conscious of all the different aspects and messages of hip pop,” Martinez said.

Though Martinez understands that hip-hop can sometimes celebrate negative stereotypes, he also recognizes that not all hip-hop music is negative.

“There are a wave of artists who are promoting socially conscious content in regard to things like consent, equality and other kinds of social commentary — and those are the artists we need to support over the other artists that promote messages that aren’t conscious,” Martinez said.

Rojas-Arauz noted that hip-hop is often a reflection of one’s reality. The toxic struggles and images of masculinity that artists are forced to personify in order to escape violence is reflected in their music.

“Hip-hop itself is not violent but it was started from a place in which violence existed,” Rojas-Arauz said.

His encouragement to students: understand that though music is a good way to start recognizing toxic masculinity, the problem exists outside of hip-hop. He said students should find positive music and look to that for inspiration.

Rojas-Arauz knows there’s no shortage of this kind of music out there.

“There is great hip-hop that is uplifting and talking about things that are real and meaningful.”