Why do people that are Into rap and hip-hop even want a high-end audio system

I think it's a different concept of high-end with a definite boost of the extreme frequencies.  Look at the Beats headphones which were popular but which no traditional audiophile would want any part of.  But mine is an outsider's view, so take it with a grain of salt.

jond, if someone suggests rap is not music (but rather some other performance art form) it's not necessarily a knock.  And even if someone finds it annoying or offensive it has nothing to do with their stance on race.  You're reading things into this that are not necessarily there.  In a real debate or a court of law what you're saying would fall flat.  If you simply want to inflame others who aren't paying attention to the facts then you are on the right track. 

So, onhwy61, if I suggest that Andy Warhol's Campbell's soup cans may not actually be art, am I continuing a tradition of bashing gays?
No, because the art itself is separate from the artist.  My opinion of Warhol's art has absolutely nothing--I repeat NOTHING--to do with his sexuality.  You think it's all connected.  It's not.  Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.  Lighten up.

It's still an unfair presumption.  It's saying, "I know what you're thinking and what's in your heart."  It's very unfair.  I was largely raised by a black lady who I loved.  I worked under black men and I worked side by side with black boys.  I formed and played in a band with a black friend when I was in high school.   I have spent my adult life playing a lot of black music, listening to a lot of black music and supporting political candidates who I think cares about minority causes.  I would never support one who I thought did not. 
I grew up in the old south.  I knew men, and sadly, kids who thought black people were inferior.  You know the story, you've seen it in movies and tv all your life and maybe you grew up with it, too.  I'll not have you putting me in with those miserable people I knew long ago.  If you do you are making a big mistake.  Excuse me if I don't sit here and take this quietly.

You're the only ones talking about cultural lineage.  We're talking about music and you attack us as if we were belittling or demeaning the culture.  Shame on you.

Everyone knows racism was rampant in 20th-century American culture and sadly, exists still today.  I saw and heard plenty growing up in the south of the 50's and 60's.  But it's possible to be hypersensitive about it.  Every single single comment about anything tied to a minority culture is not necessarily racist.  Every political opposition to our president is not necessarily race-related.  People can like or dislike something for itself.  Don't be so quick to accuse people you don't know of bias when the evidence is not there.  You might be doing something worse than the thing you're wrongly accusing the other guy of doing.

Pete Seeger once said "it's very important to learn to talk to people you disagree with."   I think there's something to that.  That's what we  do here, right?

We're all equals, here and elsewhere. Be careful if there are people you consider "way beneath" yourself lest you wind up being the snob.

Jond, by that term I meant accusing with no real basis, jumping to conclusions--sorry if I was imprecise with the words on that.  I don't know Taters and so I don't know if he's a racist or not--I will certainly give him the benefit of the doubt.  We're on a hi-fi appreciation site talking about music and I don't read racism into anything I read from his remarks (and I've probably read all the posts on all the threads you mention.  Obviously he and Calvinj are passionate about their respective feelings about the music and I like that.  Let's keep the discussion to the music and not get off on tangents or run into areas where the referees have to come in and decide if "defamatory remarks" have been made.  This place is usually civil and that's a breath of fresh air (check out ESPN or Cleveland Plain Dealer sports discussions if you want to see how bad it can get).

I'd put power/money at the top.  The whole slave trade flourished as the thing that made the south viable economically.  Without it the region faltered, to say the least.  Slavery was a means to an end, and that end was the prize.  Slavery is long gone here but business still finds ways to ensure the rich keep getting richer and the poor stay down.

Right back atcha, brother.  BTW, I got to know a lot of classical musicians (students and professors) for many years at a large music school and they were mostly very real and very warm people.  Being a hick from the sticks I sometimes felt intimidated but that was my own doing entirely--no one ever really gave me reason to feel any less than anyone else there.  I'd go back there in a heartbeat if the opportunity arose.