How YG’s ‘2004’ Turned Trauma Into a Hip Hop Therapy Session

When’s the last time a “hard” rapper made you sit with your trauma instead of your trauma making you sit with them? YG just dropped “2004,” a raw confessional about surviving childhood sexual assault, and the culture’s collective pause ain’t just about the beat. This is the same artist who gave us “Bompton” anthems and “FDT” rebellion, now peeling back layers of childhood exploitation over Buddy’s haunting hook. Why’d it take this long for a mainstream MC to say, ”Nah, that shit wasn’t cool” about statutory rape? Let’s unpack why this record is not just a song – it’s a possible lifeline.

When YG admits, “I was 14, she was 28…thought it was cool ‘til I got older,” he’s violating hip-hop’s unspoken rulebook that conflates hypermasculinity with invincibility. The track’s video – a therapy session with flashbacks to his assault – mirrors real-world treatments like cognitive processing therapy (CPT) shown to reduce PTSD symptoms in 73% of sexual assault survivors. But here’s the kicker: Black men are 4x less likely to report sexual violence than white peers (Regehr et al., 2013), often due to fear of emasculation. YG’s confession disrupts that cycle, aligning with hip-hop therapy models that use lyricism to process trauma.

Buddy’s chorus – “2004, I was lost, damn…had to heal, what it cost?” – isn’t just a hook; it’s a…