I just read a few articles about black people in America. Now, keep in mind, I am not racist, but I, as well as many of my black and white friends, feel that the downfall of blacks in America is caused not by whites or "the system," but themselves. This one is by a teacher who makes several observations about what he sees on a day-to-day basis. This one is by a black writer who is heartbroken over the abuse of black "liberation" and the over-romantsm of "ghetto culture." The same writer wrote this piece for the Wall Street Journal after the murder of a well-known rapper. My point is, many black people end up becoming their own worst enemies when they are subjected to endless self-depricating images that become horribly entrenched in their minds. Please read these articles before posting and calling me a racist. I believe heavily in equality and that goes for everyone. I would like to get some feedback from this. It could make for some interesting debate.

I dunno, but one thing's for sure, I don't like labeling people with colors >:\

i don't either. But i dont think your a racist Righteous.

Some african-americans I've met have indeed rambled off on how the white people are the cause of all of their problems, and to me, this is extremely closed minded. To have said that would mean they knew every caucasion human being on a personal level, and would have thus concluded that he or she is around simply to devise the african-american downfall, simply because the colour of his or her skin is different than my particular ethnic group's. Yes, back some years ago there was a huge problem with sick and twisted, horrible things being done to their people in our country because of ignorance and blatant fear of the unknown. However, times have changed drastically, and most of the people making those claims that their downfall is the caucasion group's fault weren't around when their father/grandfather/mother/grandmother was being abused or put down for his or her colour, and have therefore not had to experience any of that trauma. There is hate around, still. But to a FAR lesser extent, and it comes from the ignorant minority that have decided they're better than everyone else for a stupid reason they themselves never had any control over in the first place, as NOBODY has control over their skin colour.

Did it ever occur to them that the blame of another ethnicity for their problems was what started the whole racism thing in the first place? How utterly hypocritical and ignorant.

To sum up my rant, oh boo hoo, stop crying and blaming all your problems on someone else's race. Of course, not everyone does.

Just to clarify for future posters:

The debate here isn't over whether Righteous is racist, or if racial profiling is wrong.

The question here revolves around whether the promotion of a so-called "black ghetto culture", reverse discrimination, and media stereotypes help or hurt the black community in America as a whole.

There's your topic. Not Righteous and not discrimination. Debate. Go.

Thank you Missy. You are awesome, as usual.

My friends Chris and Robert are 1) brothers and 2) dark as the night itself. They have the same feelings I have about this. Ayn Rand once commented on how it doesn't matter what skin color you are, what socio-economic class you're born into, what school you attend, etc. What matters is the choices you make and how you respond to what happens to and around you. Chris commented on that because their mother was born impovershed and never once did she blame society or "the white man" for her financial burdens. She worked hard and now provide a stable living for her sons. Rap music, I feel, goes against everything that Mrs. Mack worked for. If you read the articles, so do the authors.

I can't seem to get my thoughts summed up in my head so I'll just put one quick thing.

I don't think rap music does anything like this. It's a form of expression, just as jazz, blues, classical, rock, pop, and metal all are.

As for saying that Black people put bring themselves down, well that can be said about any race.

I agree, however in this case, as stated by the articles, it is continually perpetuated by the music and culture.

i have sort of mixed feelings on this one....

on one hand...i very much dislike it when anyone blames all of their problems on another ethnic group. that's just a way of not taking responsibility for your own actions.

on the other hand...as i've mentioned countless times, i lived in harlem for awhile. and i never met anyone there who said that white people were oppressing them. but...that could be because i am very obviously white and they didn't want to voice such feelings around me. i don't like to think that of them, because these people were my friends.

it's my opinion that people like this are the minority...just as white supremacists are the minority. not everyone who talks in ebonics and/or listens to rap thinks this way....but those that do...yes i would agree they bring their problems on themselves. so do my neighbors who constantly complain about "the law" getting them into trouble -- they break the law and get arrested, it's their own fault. it's basically the same scenario.

it is HARD to break out of the ghetto...so i don't blame anyone who has to live there, mind you. i've known people who try and fail repeatedly..and i admire them because they keep giving it their best attempt. but it's my thought that someone who is constantly whining about how white people are keeping them down, probably isn't devoting much time to correcting their problems for themselves, if any. and for them i have no pity whatsoever.

That's how I feel. I've mentioned how my parents and grandparents worked their way out of poverty and I feel that everyone has that capability, however, whether or not that person actually does so it up to him or her.

Randomness:

A few years back, a radio talk show host in Chicago wrote a book called Ten Things You Never Say to A Black Person. It was against Affirmative action and basically stood for all the things these articles do. He was black.

It used to cost more to insure black people, that is until a movement caused insurence companies to raise everyone's insurence rates to that of black people's.

Um, has anyone read the articles other than me?

skin color is no matter to me.....i mean in sense i dont see skin....i see you as a personality...i dont care what color you are...getting along has to do with personality...its all ...for me about humorism and personality...

I've read the articles, and while interesting I think they do leave some things to be considered.



I've no doubt that this may be true in some cases, but then can't the same be said of the Mexicans, Irish immigrants, white 'trailer park trash' and countless other people living in America and being screwed by the system? Out of curiousity why focus on black culture in particular? Is it just because many African-Americans have found a way to vocalise their discontent through the medium of music, in particular rap? By making it known that they have been screwed over in many ways are they making themselves a 'target' rather than doing nothing about it and accepting their lot?



You say they are 'subjected' to these images, but surely one is only subjected to something when you have no way of escaping it? There are other images that a black person could turn to - black lawyer, for example isn't going to be subjected to the same imgaes, and therefore it seems to be that you refer to only a portion of the bacl population.

I had a particular problem in the use of rap or hip-hop to further this argument. Rap and hip-hop



The rap that we have now then seems to be a logical continuation from the mergence of the genre. With blacks consistently being treated as second class citizens by a fair percentage of policemen, doesn't it seem that a 'militantly adverarial stance' is warranted? The use of rap is just another way of expressing discontent, much like attending demonstrations and rallies is. Another issue is that of colour - rap is no longer an exclusively black genre - Eminem being a prime example of this. Where I come from there are countless white kids who listen to rap, talk like rap stars, dress like rap stars and generally promote that lifestyle, yet they neither come fom the ghetto or have suffered years of 'white oppression'. It seems then that rap can be a method used by people of any race or colour to show a issatisfaction with the society in which they live, a perfectly valid right.

As far as the question of to what extent rap hinders black success goes, what about the rappers who have beomce successful from promoting rap? There are many rap stars who are admired by blacks and whites, and they have made a name for themselves and distanced themselves, to some extent, from the place that they grew up. They are making moves to get out of the ghetto, and succeeding.

A final point I want to make lies with the issue of promoting sterotypes. Yes there are stereotypes of black guys riding in stolen cars with guns poking from every pocket and selling drugs, but you find examples of steroetypes evertwhere - the gay guy in the movies for example, further engenders a sterotype which isn't always true, but is neverthless what everyone thinks of. By using steroetypes it is possible to further entrench that concept in the mind, yes that is true. But it is also possible to turn that steroetype on its head and use it to its advantage. I write about the unempoloyment and disillusoinment about the S. Wales valleys, for example. A steroetype, yes to some extent, but it is also one which can be used to make people pause and think about what they are reading. I think that rap and hip-hop also intend to do this.

(And now I'll stop after realising that this sounds like a thesis!)

But they don't. All they want to do is make money. Sean "P. Diddy" Combs grew up in the suburbs, but raps like he's a born-and-bred thug. That's the kind of self perpetuation I'm talking about.

You could just as easily apply that to any number of white/oriental/middle east ethnic group - it's not an exclusively black thing and I think to pigeonhole like that can be dangerous. You mention Puff Daddy (or whatever his name is now), but that's just one person. What about all the other rappers who grew up in the ghetto and are trying to escape that through music? I can throw one (albiet cliched one) at you now - Eminem. his life story has been publicised god knows how many times, but it is a rags to riches scenario - not everyone comes from the suburbs and attempts to be someone you're not.

Besides, music is a form of expression - you don't have to experience something to write about it - I write short sci-fi stories yet I've never been to space much less lived on a colony somewhere on another planet. There is poetic licence at work here.

"I wanna slit your throat and f*ck the wound, wanna push my face in and feel the swoon, wanna dig inside and find a little bit of me 'cause our lines get crossed when you don't come clean." -#8, Slipknot, "Disasterpiece," Iowa

These are a few lnes from a song by the band Slipknot. In it, it portrays a reat amount of violence and hatred. However, because it's self expression, does it make it "okay"? Is it any less detramental to the wrong person because it's "real"? No. Rap has the same problem but much, much worse. It directly advocaes heavy drug use, murder, drug dealing, permiscuity and materialism.

And as for Eminem's life story validating is music, I went through hell growing up, as did my brother Tim (keep in mind, he's adopted). You don't see us going on about banging chicks left and right or how great it is making money as a dealer. When we make music, it's about how we want to make the world a better place. We don't glorify the filth. Look at Staind. Aaron Lewis grew up in a hellish environment, but his songs are filled with a kind of sad hope and don't go on about how great poverty or hatred are.

i'd just like to add some stuff to what wolfbane was saying about rap....

sean combs (whatever he wants to be called now, i don't really care) is NOT popular in places like harlem. this is because a. he sucks and b. like you said, he's from the suburbs.

most rappers DID grow up in the ghetto, and are simply rapping about how their life was before they made it big. well, when they first start out they are at least. after awhile it becomes all about how they're so rich, they have all these women, blah blah blah......but most people i know hate that crap. basically because they can't relate to it. but they can relate to the earlier stuff because, even though it's not pretty, that's what reality is for them.

does this mean they aren't trying to break out of that reality? of course not. i know for me, sometimes it's a bit like therapy to listen to music where the lyrics explain exactly what i'm feeling at that moment. it doesn't mean that i'm focusing on the negative stuff in my life, or that i'm not trying to make my life better. it's just a means to cope by knowing that i'm not alone, that someone has gone through what i'm going through and felt what i felt. it's the same thing there.

and btw...very little rap is about white people keeping black people down, just so ya know. a lot of it is about the struggles that people in bad neighborhoods face, and things they have to do to make ends meet.....

so we breathe in the silence breathe out the agony the indefinable indescribable agony of how to feel what to be where to go. and we dream. we follow some mindless pattern that we think will make us happy. we believe that the TV. will make us feel that words written in books will somehow make us more human that music is the food of the soul when all along our souls were anorexic and hid it from your view. you want to know the truth? happiness doesn't exist. it's never existed. we've fallen so far into the darkness that there is no light just this tumbling further and further down yet still you search for this thing that isn't even there...who needs to breathe this asphyxiated air? take the top of a high rise building take the distance to fall take the wail of ambulance sirens on another dead end street. take it all. have it all in an instant. forget the 'it could be you it could be you' and take the risk. what's to lose? another day of polluted morals of ethics bound so tight the straps blinded justice? watch the sky as you fall you might see god up there. but maybe not. he took the hard way out long ago left me and you wandering on our own. take the spare piece of rope the empty swimming pool the sawn off shotgun. take the high rise building the scattered oven the holy knife. take them. we'll get an encore for the final act.

These are a few lines from a piece of writing by me - not one of the most graphic I've written, but still dealing with a very real amount of violence. But it's self expression, and yes I think that makes it ok. Most people recognise that a song is a way of expressing yourself and it isn't always what you really think. A lot of the time people can only understand violence, and that's just one example of why I use it so much.

What do you mean when you say is it any less detrimental to the wrong person? Who is the wrong person here? The person who's being abused? The person doing the abusing? The system for not ensuring that violence can't go on? In songs, as in any creative art, there is no right or wrong person - there are only the words, and how they are interpreted. Words can only cause pain if they are taken up by another person, and then they become that person's property. To speak of a wrong person in something so general as a song really doesn't say much.

You say that rap directly advocates drug use, murder, promiscuity, but what about the movies? What about TV programmes? What about books? All of these use subjects like murder, drugs, sex, etc. as part of their subject matter - it's part of the creative process, and I believe the same to be true of rap. Going back to a point I made earlier, I write about what I know, and what I know is violence, unemployment and despair, much the same as what many rappers and other songwriters feel.

You say that you and your brother grew up in a hellish environment yet we



You are doing exactly what Eminem and other musicians do - expressing your feelings through a creative medium. Not everyone is going to sing about poverty, not everyone is going to sing about making the world a better place. You validate your own experiences and use them as extensions of youreslf, therefor things are going to be different.

As for artists saying how 'great' poverty and hatred are - I think you're mistaken in some of what you percieve. The fact that people write or sing bout poverty and hatred doesn't mean that they condone it or think it's a great thing. A lot of the time they are recounting their experiences, and the feelings that they had while going through those experiences, much the same as if you or I wrote about our experiences of love on the 'what is love' thread. I think candice is right when she says:



People can relate to rappers because they grew up in that environment. Whether you like it or not it is a very real part of society, and as a result people have different ways of coping with it. Some write about wanting to make the world a better place. Some write about how bad the world can be. Both ways show that somethings need to change.