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Old 05-24-2009, 09:21 AM
 
Location: Atlanta, GA
927 posts, read 2,218,632 times
Reputation: 749

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Acid, many people have answered you. But if your focus is on gangsta rap, then it's a loaded question and you're only looking for one type of answer.

Our culture, to me, is the opposite of what most commercial gangsta rap stands for. I make that distinction because the commercialism of what some types of rap has become (materialistic, self-aggrandizing) is also very distinct from what rap was about at its onset (struggling to overcome in the face of systemic obstacles, being confident in the face of poverty, etc).

Whether we recognize it or not, our culture consists of a lot of African values. For instance, that sense of family, extended family and communalism is African in its origins. Just think about how many family reunions and play cousins and play uncles a lot of our people have.

Spirituality and giving thanks to ancestors is also African and something a lot of us espouse in various formations, whether it's libation at Kwanzaa or pouring an ounce of 40 on the streets. Our people espouse our "thanks" in various ways, across classes, and I think that is what has kept us together, our kids mostly away from drugs and alcohol, and united us even in the face of racism and discrimination. If you think about it, most of our social revolutions were connected with a spiritual or religious practice.

Also, you say 40 years after Jim Crow, but numbers are a matter of perspective. One could also say that after 400 years of being treated as less than human, overt racism and dehumanizing acts of oppression, and with just 40 years of "freedom" we have a Black president, the richest and arguably most influential woman in media is a Black woman, African Americans are the most economically well-off across the Diaspora, and our people continue to fight relentlessly to do well in this country.

Crime is generally an aspect of poverty. So if you can change people's economic circumstances, please believe the behavior will change.

It's not about culture alone changing the situation, we have the tools already. It's about having the actual political and economic resources, and a mindset dedicated to changing the lives of low-income and poor black people, to change the situation, and that's what we have to fight for more of.


Quote:
Originally Posted by AcidSnake View Post
I like your interpretation of African American culture. Here is my observation/question: What is this "culture" of ours doing to provide the many young African American men(women) with something to believe in other than this pervasive & fanatical desire towards material gain? Because it seems that being tied together by skin color alone just isn't cutting it.

Why after about 40 years away from Jim Crow is there still a small subsect of African American society that produces disprotionate violent interactions like robberies & shootings relative to our population count in the U.S.? Is our "culture" as it is currently oriented unable to mitigate this situation?

This where I was getting at when I started this thread. I just want to hear from others like yourself if they are seeing things the same way or if there is another factor and/or trend that I am overlooking.

 
Old 05-24-2009, 09:47 AM
 
Location: Atlanta
3,573 posts, read 5,288,552 times
Reputation: 2396
Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Acid, many people have answered you. But if your focus is on gangsta rap, then it's a loaded question and you're only looking for one type of answer.
I disagree. They have given me their version of what black culture is but has not to not my satisfaction answered why our culture hasn't been able been to mitigate the violence in the community.

And if it is a "loaded question" in the sense that I am "trapping" someone into answering the question in a way that only statisfy me, then you are right. But those questions to me are the questions that our American society has historically shied away from because it hits so close to home and it forces us into rigorous self-critique and many cannot handle such a thing.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Our culture, to me, is the opposite of what most commercial gangsta rap stands for. I make that distinction because the commercialism of what some types of rap has become (materialistic, self-aggrandizing) is also very distinct from what rap was about at its onset (struggling to overcome in the face of systemic obstacles, being confident in the face of poverty, etc).
Agreed.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Whether we recognize it or not, our culture consists of a lot of African values. For instance, that sense of family, extended family and communalism is African in its origins. Just think about how many family reunions and play cousins and play uncles a lot of our people have.

Spirituality and giving thanks to ancestors is also African and something a lot of us espouse in various formations, whether it's libation at Kwanzaa or pouring an ounce of 40 on the streets. Our people espouse our "thanks" in various ways, across classes, and I think that is what has kept us together, our kids mostly away from drugs and alcohol, and united us even in the face of racism and discrimination. If you think about it, most of our social revolutions were connected with a spiritual or religious practice.
Most enlightening.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Also, you say 40 years after Jim Crow, but numbers are a matter of perspective. One could also say that after 400 years of being treated as less than human, overt racism and dehumanizing acts of oppression, and with just 40 years of "freedom" we have a Black president, the richest and arguably most influential woman in media is a Black woman, African Americans are the most economically well-off across the Diaspora, and our people continue to fight relentlessly to do well in this country.
Good perspective.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Crime is generally an aspect of poverty. So if you can change people's economic circumstances, please believe the behavior will change.

It's not about culture alone changing the situation, we have the tools already. It's about having the actual political and economic resources, and a mindset dedicated to changing the lives of low-income and poor black people, to change the situation, and that's what we have to fight for more of.
I'm not quite so sure about that. I've seen many people who come from two parent homes and still comment violent acts. Even in one parent homes where there still a relatively decent amount of economic comfort, criminal action still seems to be the first choice.

There many societies on this planet who do not have the material comfort that even the poorest of African Americans posess and yet still manage to survive & not kill each other to the extent that a subsect of African American society does. I am asking: why?

If that question seems a bit much, that's because it was meant to be so. If I can't ask a question like this without being ridiculed then maybe there is no solution. U.S. AttyGen. Eric Holder may be right...
 
Old 05-24-2009, 11:20 AM
 
572 posts, read 1,865,578 times
Reputation: 522
Quote:
Originally Posted by AcidSnake View Post
"Gangsta" rap is solely being promoted by black rap artists(maybe some hispanics too but I haven't seen any in the mainstream as of late) so there is no stereotype or rumored suggestion about that, just plain facts & reality.
This is easy to explain. Asian & White rappers are not seen as "gangsta." Again big record companies make the final decision on what gets played and who gets on. A lot of these top executives are going on stereotypes, and stereotypically black people are the low life thugs of society, so they fit the image.

You can tell from some movies that come out that feature black characters, that the producers don't know black people or don't hang around no black people. Have you ever watched a movie as a black person and been like "What the Hell! Black people don't act like that." They go on what they know, which is little.

I'm sure that Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Dick Cheney would've been great gangsta rappers, but they don't fit the image.

Especially Dick Cheney. You know how gangsta you got to be to shoot your friend and then your friend apologizes to YOU!! LOL
 
Old 05-24-2009, 11:37 AM
 
Location: Atlanta ,GA
9,067 posts, read 15,734,223 times
Reputation: 2980
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdiggs1 View Post
This is easy to explain. Asian & White rappers are not seen as "gangsta." Again big record companies make the final decision on what gets played and who gets on. A lot of these top executives are going on stereotypes, and stereotypically black people are the low life thugs of society, so they fit the image.

You can tell from some movies that come out that feature black characters, that the producers don't know black people or don't hang around no black people. Have you ever watched a movie as a black person and been like "What the Hell! Black people don't act like that." They go on what they know, which is little.

I'm sure that Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Dick Cheney would've been great gangsta rappers, but they don't fit the image.

Especially Dick Cheney. You know how gangsta you got to be to shoot your friend and then your friend apologizes to YOU!! LOL
Yeh Dick is an O.G.for sure!LOL
 
Old 05-24-2009, 02:17 PM
 
Location: Atlanta
3,573 posts, read 5,288,552 times
Reputation: 2396
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdiggs1 View Post
This is easy to explain. Asian & White rappers are not seen as "gangsta." Again big record companies make the final decision on what gets played and who gets on. A lot of these top executives are going on stereotypes, and stereotypically black people are the low life thugs of society, so they fit the image.

You can tell from some movies that come out that feature black characters, that the producers don't know black people or don't hang around no black people. Have you ever watched a movie as a black person and been like "What the Hell! Black people don't act like that." They go on what they know, which is little.

I'm sure that Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Dick Cheney would've been great gangsta rappers, but they don't fit the image.

Especially Dick Cheney. You know how gangsta you got to be to shoot your friend and then your friend apologizes to YOU!! LOL
George Dubya is the biggest "gangsta" in modern times! How else can a guy like that start a war in which hundreds of thousands of people die, millions displaced thru ethnic cleansing based on for all practical purposes, a lie? And no one holds him accountable for that?

THAT my friends, is "gangsta"...
 
Old 05-24-2009, 04:54 PM
 
Location: Chicago
526 posts, read 1,054,835 times
Reputation: 162
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdiggs1 View Post




4. Coolness - black people do everything cool. The way we dress, wear our hair, drink lemonade, clip our toenails, pay taxes. No other people have as much flavor as black Americans. We have a culture of being cool, or tying to be cool.

5. The dozens - that is something that is unique. Black men like to trash talk and go at each other, and it's all in good nature. The dozens is what rap battling came from: men going at each other seeing which one can outwit the other. It's all about one's mental ability.

well weave for one is no cool, it takes forever to take out..
jumping around like you have ants in your pants makes you look a fool...
i dont understand why black men can grow out their hair, but the woman cant???
rap battling i dont know were your from, but over here in chicago it usually ends up in someone getting beat down or shot...
soo... to be honest you stated the foolishness of your race, i can say some very foolish things about white people if i wanted... that would make my post look dumb like you did to yours
 
Old 05-24-2009, 05:31 PM
 
Location: Atlanta, GA
927 posts, read 2,218,632 times
Reputation: 749
Acid, thank you for taking stock into some of the things I have said. For your final point about there still being violence in black two-parent families, yes this does happen, and yes some black people who are rich commit acts of violence.

But before we go deeper into those cases, we must first ask how true across the board that is. What studies have you seen that show the pervasiveness of violence among middle-income or two-parent African-American households? We can all point to anecdotes, but what evidence do you have to show that this is indeed pervasive?

There can be all types of familial, biological, and environmental issues that come into play when thinking about why anyone commits an act of crime. Criminal activity is generally too complex to blame any one thing, yet often when it happens in Black families the first thing some point to is a lack of "culture."

There has to be some clarity into what exactly your argument is. Is our culture supposed to prevent ALL acts of violence? Are you saying we have a really high crime rate across the board and our culture is supposed to significantly decrease it? If it's the former, that may be damn near impossible given the previous point I made about how environmental, biological, and social conditions can all contribute to why someone commits a crime. If it's the latter, do you have evidence showing that our culture is not, in fact, preventing a lot of crime from happening when it otherwise could be?

For instance, researchers for decades have been trying to figure out why more black youth do not consume drugs and alcohol, as, contrary to popular belief, black youth are less likely than both whites and Latinos to consume most types of drugs and alcohol than these two ethnic groups. Some scientists have suggested a strong connection to religious and social groups that prevent this behavior, others have suggested that black youth are responding to the expectation that they would consume them by overtly not consuming it, like a reverse stereotype threat.

This is an example of how our culture is preventing a crime. So on what are you basing your claim that our culture is NOT preventing certain criminal activity and what evidence do you have to support the belief (and I believe this is your point) that Black culture favors violence?

Quote:
Originally Posted by AcidSnake View Post
I disagree. They have given me their version of what black culture is but has not to not my satisfaction answered why our culture hasn't been able been to mitigate the violence in the community.

And if it is a "loaded question" in the sense that I am "trapping" someone into answering the question in a way that only statisfy me, then you are right. But those questions to me are the questions that our American society has historically shied away from because it hits so close to home and it forces us into rigorous self-critique and many cannot handle such a thing.



Agreed.



Most enlightening.



Good perspective.



I'm not quite so sure about that. I've seen many people who come from two parent homes and still comment violent acts. Even in one parent homes where there still a relatively decent amount of economic comfort, criminal action still seems to be the first choice.

There many societies on this planet who do not have the material comfort that even the poorest of African Americans posess and yet still manage to survive & not kill each other to the extent that a subsect of African American society does. I am asking: why?

If that question seems a bit much, that's because it was meant to be so. If I can't ask a question like this without being ridiculed then maybe there is no solution. U.S. AttyGen. Eric Holder may be right...

Last edited by bizchick86; 05-24-2009 at 06:07 PM..
 
Old 05-24-2009, 07:27 PM
 
Location: Atlanta
3,573 posts, read 5,288,552 times
Reputation: 2396
Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
Acid, thank you for taking stock into some of the things I have said. For your final point about there still being violence in black two-parent families, yes this does happen, and yes some black people who are rich commit acts of violence.
I try to. I may have a hard time admitting to being wrong but in the end it only makes me stronger, especially when someone comes at me with a strong argument.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
But before we go deeper into those cases, we must first ask how true across the board that is. What studies have you seen that show the pervasiveness of violence among middle-income or two-parent African-American households? We can all point to anecdotes, but what evidence do you have to show that this is indeed pervasive?
I never said that crime by two-parent households was pervasive, only that in my personal life I have seen plenty instances of it, and that was merely to counter your generalization that crime is economic based.

If you are asking me to put up numbers for my generalization I humbly request that you do the same for your generalization.

But just to prove my point about our community contributing too much to crime population wise, here are some general numbers of murder victims, black & white that were compiled by the U.S. DOJ in 2007. These two links are for single victim/single offender homicides.

Expanded Homicide Data Table 1 - Crime in the United States 2007 (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_01.html - broken link)


Expanded Homicide Data Table 5 - Crime in the United States 2007 (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_05.html - broken link)

Here is link to violent victimization percentages by race. I would say that I am pleasantly surprised that it has went down pretty drastically over last 20+ years though.

Bureau of Justice Statistics Race of Victim Trends #3 (http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/tables/racetab.htm - broken link)

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
There can be all types of familial, biological, and environmental issues that
come into play when thinking about why anyone commits an act of crime. Criminal activity is generally too complex to blame anyone thing, yet often when it happens in Black families the first thing some point to is a lack of "culture."?
Which is why I am asking the question. If the reasons for the crime is as complex as you say, would it not behoove us black folks as a group to sit down and discuss why and create possible solutions to counter-act this? Also there has to be SOME reason why crime is more prevalent within some groups than it is in others. For the average layman the only reason he/she may be able to think of IS culture, considering that there is no other readily available research for them to rely on.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
There has to be some clarity into what exactly your argument is. Is our culture supposed to prevent ALL acts of violence? Are you saying we have a really high crime rate across the board and our culture is supposed to significantly decrease it? If it's the former, that may be damn near impossible given the previous point I made about how environmental, biological, and social conditions can all contribute to why someone commits a crime. If it's the latter, do you have evidence showing that our culture is not, in fact, preventing a lot of crime from happening when it otherwise could be?
To answer the first point, no our culture can't prevent ALL crime period and that is NOT the point of my thread. 2nd point: in comparison to other groups & population wise, yes crime rates for African americans is too high, for me anyways.

I will re-iterate again that I am wondering what it could that African American culture is lacking that would allow so many within it to be criminalized. Also to your third point I don't think it's impossible, because certainly other countries with relatively less wealth say, Malaysia can have low homicide rates, can not the same happen here?

Quote:
Originally Posted by bizchick86 View Post
For instance, researchers for decades have been trying to figure out why more black youth do not consume drugs and alcohol, as, contrary to popular belief, black youth are less likely than both whites and Latinos to consume most types of drugs and alcohol than these two ethnic groups. Some scientists have suggested a strong connection to religious and social groups that prevent this behavior, others have suggested that black youth are responding to the expectation that they would consume them by overtly not consuming it, like a reverse stereotype threat.

This is an example of how our culture is preventing a crime. So on what are you basing your claim that our culture is NOT preventing certain criminal activity and what gives you the impression that violence is a part of Black culture?
I base my claim off the numbers as compiled by the Department of Justice and Georgia Bureau of Investigations. I also base it off my perception as many human beings who hold strong convictions & beliefs about certain situations often do.

For example: There was huge out-cry of people who turn out for the public forum Chief Pennington & Mayor Franklin had a while back on why Kathryn Johnston was killed by the APD. Yet the many black on black murders that I see taking place in Atlanta do not illicit a similar response.

Also there is notable silence in the black church when it comes to these situations. The church to me plays a major role in the shaping of black culture, and that unfortunate silence to me equals complicity in the violence plaguing our community. That is my perception, take it or leave it.
 
Old 05-25-2009, 07:52 AM
 
Location: Atlanta,GA
2,685 posts, read 6,404,433 times
Reputation: 1232
Quote:
Originally Posted by justalicious6989 View Post
well weave for one is no cool, it takes forever to take out..
jumping around like you have ants in your pants makes you look a fool...
i dont understand why black men can grow out their hair, but the woman cant???
rap battling i dont know were your from, but over here in chicago it usually ends up in someone getting beat down or shot...
soo... to be honest you stated the foolishness of your race, i can say some very foolish things about white people if i wanted... that would make my post look dumb like you did to yours
Hilarious..
 
Old 05-25-2009, 10:16 AM
 
572 posts, read 1,865,578 times
Reputation: 522
Quote:
Originally Posted by justalicious6989 View Post
well weave for one is no cool, it takes forever to take out..
jumping around like you have ants in your pants makes you look a fool...
i dont understand why black men can grow out their hair, but the woman cant???
rap battling i dont know were your from, but over here in chicago it usually ends up in someone getting beat down or shot...
soo... to be honest you stated the foolishness of your race, i can say some very foolish things about white people if i wanted... that would make my post look dumb like you did to yours
I know I was going to catch some slack for my coolness statement. I did state that some black people TRY to be cool, I didn't exactly say they were cool at what they were doing.

The majority of rap battles do not end up in violence; you say it like its predominant. There are ignorant people anywhere, and it seems like you only watch ignorant people rap battle. I don't know about you but I can tell when a rap battle is about to get ignorant, and I politely walk off

Jumping around like you have ants in your pants is called dancing, a form of art. Beautiful art is in the eye of the beholder. I don't know what you would call good dancing, but remember that almost any dance you see anybody doing is influenced by black people; except river dancing, LOL. White people got us with that one. That's the only dance black people couldn't master.

i dont understand why black men can grow out their hair, but the woman cant???

OK, that was funny, LOL.
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