Kids are sold songs like this:
I shot dread in the head, took the bread and the landspread Lil' Gotti got the shotty to your body So don't resist, or you might miss Christmas I tote guns, I make number runs I give emcees the runs drippin when I throw my clip in the AK, I slay from far away Everybody hit the DECK
Then they're sold violent video games like this:
"Scarface" has a so-called "balls meter" that fills up when you shoot people, and when you taunt your freshly dead enemies. When it's full, you can press a button and go into a "Blind Rage" that temporarily changes the game into a first-person shooter. Doing this not only makes you invincible, you'll actually gain health with every person you kill.
Then they're sold $279 jeans with picture's of murdered black men photocopied on them. And after listening to murder glorified in music, and practiced for hours in video games, seen repeatedly on TV and in the movies some 16 year old boy gets shot dead everyone looks at each other and asks how this can happen. Follow the money and don't look so surprised.
11 comments:
Answers your question about teh different world of Hartford -- it's not apples and trees, but culture, both parents present, and possibly even religion.....
So you have decided to skip middle age and go straight to bigoted curmedgeon? It's not the music, the entertainment, or the couture...maybe its the guns? the socioeconomics? who is buying those jeans and that music and those games? not the kids getting shot...its your neighbors kids in the suburbs.
Give it a name already Dexter. By any standard “thug” culture is disastrous for poor blacks. Yeah suburban kids listen, play and watch all that crap too but they aren’t killing each other every other week, at least not yet. Is this because of affluence alone? I doubt it. There’s a turd in the punch bowl, keep drinking and making excuses and accusations if you like but I would rather not. Culture matters. You can’t glorify murder 12 hours a day and wonder why 16 year olds are shooting each other over insults. It’s not the guns, the places with the most stringent gun laws also have the highest rates of homicide by gun. So try again.
Why do people use the word "socioeconomic" when they really only mean "economic"? Dexter, if you're truly interested in the social factors as well as the economic ones, then culture is clearly a legitimate issue.
Attacking the trappings or commercial reflections of the culture is not addressing the root problem. Which places with the most stringent gun laws that have the highest rates? England? Canada? Baghdad? That doesn't wash.
If you want to talk about the "root problem", fine, NOBODY is stopping you. The thing is: you didn't do that. Instead you responded to the dude's post with an ad hominem, calling him a bigot. That's just not very helpful, useful, thoughtful...
As for the "commercial reflections of the culture" how is that not a valid issue as well? Doesn't a reflection tell us something about the thing reflected?
Ad hominem? The dude is used to swapping yo mominem attacks as starters. My point was the shootings had nothing to do with the tupac jeans, the video game or the rap music. "following the money" doesn't solve or prevent or explain the crime. I know that the Dude has played and enjoyed similar types games while listening to Husker Du's Diane but that doesn't lead him into the streets with his 7.62 AR15 locked and loaded. It just seems that attacking the hip-hop cultural because you are biased against it is too easy a straw man and doesnt really address the root problems of poverty, drugs etc...
Dexter,
I have never owed a 7.62X39 weapon, never will and yes I have played some pretty insipid video games in my life while listening to Husker Du and more likely Huevos Rancheros.
You can write whatever you like about me because God knows I deserve it and probably said worse to and about you, so let’s not sweat that, it’s among friends.
I would like you to respond at some point to the single issue that I tried to make – kids are murdering each other and instead of acting with anything resembling responsibility the entertainment industry fans the flames and gets rich selling pathology. If Vogue magazine covers send a bad message to America’s young women and girls about body image, what message would you want sent to the kids shooting each other?
Poetic license (".38, .39 Whatever it takes") I prefer playing the role of a WWII German sniper games but it doesnt make me Wehrmacht or SS. What is the industry supposed to do? They are creating games for adults. You want government regulations? MOre i mean. Anyways...
Friday afternoon/evening rendevous? Will be tailgating saturday at UConn game with the one and only P.S.
Doolitte may be availble. Smooch scrambled to the 'Cuse.
Poetic license (".38, .39 Whatever it takes") I prefer playing the role of a WWII German sniper games but it doesnt make me Wehrmacht or SS. What is the industry supposed to do? They are creating games for adults. You want government regulations? MOre i mean. Anyways...
Friday afternoon/evening rendevous? Will be tailgating saturday at UConn game with the one and only P.S.
Doolitte may be availble. Smooch scrambled to the 'Cuse.
Dexter, the Dude is more than able to defend himself. That's not why I rebuked you for the ad hominem. It's a bullshit tactic designed to short-circuit debate. You deserved to be slammed for it and Slam I am.
As for attacking hip-hop culture, he didn't do that. He attacked a sub-genre of hip-hop: Gangsta Rap. It's not a strawman to say this is bad culture or to claim it can have a malign influence. Of course it is and it can.
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