Pictured are  R& B artists Janet Jackson, (wearingBlack), and Chaka Khan

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CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, CLEVELAND, Ohio – The Cleveland-based Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has chosen its inductees for the class of 2016 and aside from the Black hip hop group N.W.A, has virtually shut out Black nominees, including Grammy award winning R&B artists Janet Jackson, and Chaka Khan, the 'Queen of Funk."

And women, regardless of race, were snubbed altogether.

A third, or five of the 15 nominees, were Black,  and in addition to Jackson, Khan and N.W.A., were Chic and the Spinners.

Khan and Jackson were the only women nominees, though the 70s R&B band Chic, also among the 10 nominees that  did not win, was comprised of three men and two women, all of them Black.

Blacks and women were simply railroaded, a Cleveland Urban News.Com investigation reveals.

The five chosen for induction this year, including N.W.A., are the White male groups of Chicago, Deep Purple, and Cheap Trick, and legendary rocker Steve Miller,72, as an individual inductee, who is also White, and who criticized the Rock Hall for its customary exclusion of women. He, in fact, has called for new leadership.

Yes, and the Cars were among the White groups overlooked for induction.

The induction ceremony, held April 8 in  New York City, will air on HBO on April 30.

N.W.A., an abbreviation of Niggaz Wit Attitudes, was an American hip hop group out of Compton, California that had its heyday during the mid 80s and early 90s. It's music, though popular for its time in segments of America's Black community and elsewhere, mainly young people, was primarily hardcore gangsta rap that often subordinated and degraded Black women and girls.

But the group's success paved the way for young Black hip hop artists like P-Diddy, Snoop Dog and the late East Coast rivals Tupac Shakur and Biggy Smalls to make a living and to succeed in an arena that historically gave entree' to Whites.

Notwithstanding the sometimes offensive musical lyrics that group members deemed as merely a reflection of the times and a venue for self-expression and Black dialogue, N.W.A promoted Civil Rights, and spoke out against police brutality, of which they say they were subjected to on a regular basis.

The most well-known members are Dr. Dre, the late Easy-E , who died in 1995 at 30 from complications from AIDS, and Ice Cube, one of the founding members who is also a popular Hollywood actor who promoted the 2015 motion picture "Straight Outta Compton, an entertaining and well-documented depiction of the beginnings and subsequent rise of N.W.A.

Ice Cube found himself defending claims that NW.A. is not rock and roll at last week's ceremony where group members performed?

If N.W.A. is not rock and roll than neither are some of this year's White inductees, depending on how rock and roll is defined, sometimes as black blues and jazz with a Western swing, or, by another definition, "an amalgam of Black rhythm and blues and white country music."

Now a landmark of the majority Black major American city of Cleveland, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was founded in 1983 under the tenure of then Cleveland Mayor Michael R. White, a former state senator and progressive Black, and an academician. It is one of the nation's most prominent music history museums.

Not counting the 2016 inductees, the Rock Hall has named some 312 inductees since its opening in 1986, and less than 14 percent are women.

Rock Hall President and CEO Gregg Harris did not return phone calls seeking comment on the all male review and dearth of Black and women inductees.

Chicago won the online fan vote with some 36 million votes, though that is not the only indicator for selection, and the integrity of that process as come under scrutiny.

Historically, the music industry often marginalizes African-Americans, data show, regardless of their talents, which are widespread, both nationally and internationally.

A self described rock and roll ban with a string of ballets and 23 gold records and $40 million dollars worth of units sold, Chicago was followed in the online voting for the inductee selection process by the rock group Yes, the Cars, Deep Purple, and Steve Miller.

A member of the famous Jackson family and a sister of the late pop artist Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson came in sixth place with 9.4 million online Rock Hall votes.

Janet Jackson has sold more than 160 million records and is ranked one  the best selling artist in contemporary history, and she holds the record for the most selling hits on the Billboard Top 100.

At issue though are mounting claims of hacking relative to the Rock Hall website for the inductee wannabe's, due in part, sources say, to a surge in votes, particularly for Chicago, and during a week-long period this last summer of alleged computer glitches, sources said.

The Cleveland Urban News.Com investigation further reveals that as to YouTube clicks  of videos of songs, Deep Purple, a hard metal and modern day hard rock band founded in Hereford England in 1968, ranks first, followed by Janet Jackson with her R& B video hit of her song dubbed "No Sleep", the lead single for her 11th studio album 'Unbreakable."

Unbreakable was released last year, getting roughly 10.8 million YouTube views, the 11th studio album by Jackson, 49.

In comparison, the Rhythm Nation breakout video of Jackson's 1989 billboard hit has gotten some 7.6 million YouTube views or clicks.

Widely known as the 'Queen of Funk,' the Grammy-winning Chaka Khan is third among the 15 nominees of 2016 on YouTube with her popular "Ain't Nobody," which she released in 1983 and of which reached number-one on the U.S. R&B charts, and number 22 on the U.S . Billboard Hot 100. It has some 20.4 million YouTube views.   Her second parent album, 'Rag to Riches" went platinum, selling over a million copies.

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