CONTROVERSY, ILM-STYLE: HipHop, R&B, and their influence on chilluns

teaches kids (both boys and girls, of all races and classes) to disrespect women - and as such represents no alternative to mainstream american culture (as much as its defenders would like to see it as "subversive")

Well, i don't think that it represents no alternative to mainstream amer. culture, i think it's certainly still subversive, although with respect to misogyny etc. then i'd agree, there are very conservative threads within mainstream american culture that bubble up in popular music.

i'm not really sure what i would do, if i felt i could do something. tell kids to grow up? like that will work. tell them they won't get any acting like jerks to chix? that won't fly either (and let's face it - some girls (not ones i'm interested in btw) seem to like jerks - prolly a result of this sort of conditioning!).

i am interested on ilm's take on this. not sure if it's as common in other cities (i didn't really notice shit like this in chicago as much - but then i took public transportation less then too), in nyc it seems rampant. to the point that i actively hate riding the train when school lets out.

About three years ago, I taught theatre at this government-funded summer camp for disadvanted youth, and all the campers were black from ages seven to eleven. anyway, during every lunch break, all the campers would crowd around the base of this TV mounted way up on a wall and stare at B.E.T. They knew all the rappers, dances, signs, lyrics--everything! it was incredible.. but is that a bad thing? i never saw them "slapping their bitches" or anything like that, but I broke up a fight between two of the kids and one of them said to the other, "You gonna be dead tomorrow!" That kind of shook me up, so I asked the proposed victim if he thought the the threat was serious. He said something like, "Maaaaaaaan, he don't got no gun." Phew. "Maybe his cousin does, though."

and one time (this is going to sound REALLY weird) i stumbled on this file of all the students that the counselor at the camp maintained. it had all sorts of twisted information, like when they lost their virginity and how many sexual partners the kids claimed to have had.. ten years old!

have i said anything worthile? i'm going to stop. i don't know what the fuck i'm talking about. a night of catching up on half a semester of metaphysics turned into a night of guiness swilling... ugh..

(there's no way a 30 yo slovenly-dressed white dude has any authority over any teenager).

i'm going to hold you to that!

blount, yesterday on the 7 coming back from shea (your fellow georgian john rocker once said it was something like "freaks" and "pink-hair'd faggots" or somesuch that ride it, 'member?) there was this hispanic-manic-panic kid looking about 13-14 with a kick-ass black sabbath t-shirt and bondage pants. he was just riding, sullen, by himself, not harassing anything with boobs and a vagina. kids still listen to rock, ozzy teaches respect yo' mama, etc., etc. HIGH-larious.

to hstencil - do you reall think that rich african-americans rapping about crime/race/culture is not subversive? Think about the implications in a country with a past like ours!

and one time (this is going to sound REALLY weird) i stumbled on this file of all the students that the counselor at the camp maintained. it had all sorts of twisted information, like when they lost their virginity and how many sexual partners the kids claimed to have had.. ten years old!

i live in a predominantly african-american neighborhood (no "you hate black people and your neighbors" card, blount - i love where i live and think it's the best place in nyc to live).

in the early 90s i was a camp counselor (think "humpty dance" or nwa era). stuff was explicit then, but i don't remember kids acting in the way they do now. maybe it's different tho since i was an "authority figure" whereas on the c i'm just another shlump on his way to/from work.

(there's no way a 30 yo slovenly-dressed white dude has any authority over any teenager).

i'm going to hold you to that!

your posts are proof.

ok so what's the reason you left rock out then?

yeah but as i described i don't remember early 90s kids (having been one myself back then) acting this way despite exposure to nwa/2 live/etc. maybe kentucky kids are just more polite?

i left rock out because duh i don't see many rock/goth/metal kids acting like this (i assure you there are plenty in nyc tho! some are even minorities/poor!). they're mostly the loner type.

xpost - no, dizzle, when the status quo is reinforced, i don't see how hiphop/r&b is "revolutionary" or changing diddly-squat.

oh man. go easy. when i started writing it, hstencil was hanging out to dry!

probably.

no, dizzle, when the status quo is reinforced, i don't see how hiphop/r&b is "revolutionary" or changing diddly-squat.

Well what do you expect from, you know, popular music? It can ONLY be culturally subversive, its not going to create some sort of magical economic justice or something, and its very culturally subversive!

xp hstencil but O'Reilly is tapping into these "morals," his motives are irrelevent - the "silent majority" are not the ones putting O'Reilly on the pop charts, their kids are.

"hey, dirtah, babee i got your money don't you worry"

xp:his motives are completely relevant! argh why are so many pop apologists (not that i know if you are one, per se) on ILM unwilling to look at pop culture thru an economic lens!? o'reilly is about, yes, tapping into morals that aren't his -- in order to increase fox's viewership which in turn affects fox's ad sales rates! duh!

What does this have to do with what I'm saying exactly? My point is that O'Reilly may not care about these so-called "morals" but he's tapping into some very REAL feelings from his viewers. Rap is subversive when you have the parents watching O'Reilly and hating the rap music and the kids just want to listen to 50 Cent.

Is Bill O'Reilly subversive when the parents listen to rap music and the kids just want right-wing political dogma?

xp dom yes obviously.

you sure it wasn't the riot grrrrls? haha just kidding.

What does this have to do with what I'm saying exactly? My point is that O'Reilly may not care about these so-called "morals" but he's tapping into some very REAL feelings from his viewers.

my point is, it doesn't matter even if his viewers "feel strongly" about these morals and act on them by watching o'reilly, because then they're supporting the very thing they're condemning.

Rap is subversive when you have the parents watching O'Reilly and hating the rap music and the kids just want to listen to 50 Cent.

i dunno. again i hate to make this a rock v. rap argument (too late! sez blount) and it'd be way specious and dumb to say this but, hey look:

50s-60s-70s - rock predominance in american music culture coincides with civil rights movement, anti-war movement, feminism, gay rights movement, la raza, etc.

80s-90s-00s - waning rock predominance, waxing hiphop predominance in american culture coincides with reagan, bush I + first gulf war (to "liberate" islamic kingdom), clinton (liberal my ass he killed welfare + monica) and bush II (we all know what a mess that is).

(the preceding socioculturalpolitical "analysis" not to be taken seriously, obv.!) (not even by you, blount!)

xpost - i wasn't accusing you dizzle, just putting that out there as a pre-emptive measure even tho this thred is pretty much designed for CONTROVERSY!

http://www.musicmatic.de/P/Prince_5a.jpg

"we" "right"

xp its ok no hard feelings.

i think the difference between white kids watching BET and black kids watching BET is that the performers on BET are black, and the content of so many rap videos is literally shot after shot of black people in positions of wealth, sex, and power. so i guess the assumption (whether it's bullshit or not) is that young, poor black kids see their respected, er, idols saying this or wearing this, and so they emulate them.. this all sounds so damn white of me, but is it wrong to say that white kids have a lot more varied accepted public figures to emulate?

xpost exactly matos! check it:

"i wish we all were nude" /= fake tittie showing in 50 cent vid while 50's ugly mug wears versace (not that i wanna see fiddy naked either, yugh) (hell i don't even like hearing him much less seeing his ugly ass)

"I wish there were no rules" /= "keep this bitch in line, pack the sc, ban abortion, outlaw homos, buy pepsi/luda cds," etc.

(obv. my elevation of prince as anarcho-bacchanalian GOD is tongue-in-cheek, like most of this thread")

and i'm talking about pre-teen young here.

Also if you are completely unfamiliar with urban/crunk slang and don't really know much standard English, either.

I HATE
YOU SO UMF
RIGHT NOW

AUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH!

I know, but like I said, right *now* is a time where the context of What's Happening Now makes the use of such language/imagery in a pop song unsettling. Let's put it this way, I felt skeeved when I first heard what the frickin' TITLE was, not even one note of the song. That may be overreacting on my part, I don't know, but I still don't like it. (So clearly nobody should be covering Donny Osmond's "Soldier of Love" now either. ;-) ) As for the performances for the military, ay yi yi. (I'm a great loather of the whole 'for the boys' shtick.)

Speak for yourself. And LD, I'm objecting to you holding up Destiny's Child in general. They've got some of the most shallow and non-progressive lyrics out there generally. "You got cash, boy...Oh well, I do! You gotta have some floss to get with me!"

Except when it's good New Romantic homo-schlock, right, Ned? ;)

Prove me that Kajagoogoo played a US military rally in 1983 or 1984 and we'll talk. ;-)

I don't get (and to be honest, I don't really want to get) how this equates to misogyny.

x-post

Haha. But that was THE boy, not the boyS.

http://web.archive.org/web/20040213181138/http://www.punkplanet.com/archives/00000004.html

I want to respond to this whole thread unfortunately it's going to take more time than I have at the moment and nothing I'm writing is cohering, but I think there needs to be more discussion of the economic side of things, in the sense of 'hiphop makes money selling this misogynistic image' and how women and economics are talked about within hiphop. With the rock misogyny vs hiphop misogyny, hiphop tends to have more of a narrative of 'society producing the bitch/ho', whereas rock tends more towards 'women are just like that'. With the discussion of why people aren't critising every form of misogyny in popular music, well at the moment it's kind of a triage situation (plus the fact that it's not just about music but society as whole).

Dunno. Why is it fucked up?

Not at all.

Men looking at women sexually when women are trying to get on with other stuff (like getting or doing their jobs, travelling on the bus, hanging out in the bar with friends etc.) is just a pain in the ass. That's not misogyny.

Men thinking that this is the women's problem and men have no responsibility to stop = misogyny.

re : YMCA

"Because it's about having anonymous sex in public?"

What's wrong with that?

Why is that a pain in the ass? Are the men masturbating while this is going on?

What's wrong with that?

Most people don't think it's appropriate for their young children (or hell, their GROWN children) to sing songs about anonymous sexual encounters.

is this a typo or are you suggesting that music analysis is sorting genres according to which one needs the most medical attention (ie, which one is suffering "the most" from mysogyny)?

xpost - no I think he's saying that rock gets moved down the list because no one listens to rock anymore. If Nickelback had five songs in the top-10, then their stance on women might be looked at more.

(xxpost)

I think "looking at women sexually" is too vague to make this sort of generalization about. If everyone followed the strictest sort of rules about these things, I wonder how often men and women would get together (as sex partners) at all. I think some sort of basic consideration and case-by-case judgment is the way to go, rather than making hard and fast rules (about looking).

does anyone know why there are young people around all areas doing this to innocent people?
if you dont know what i'm talking about, its those videos being sent around on phone videos showing mostly young black boys, slapping, flykiking beating up innocent passers by just for their amusement and to pass them around on phones.

what possible reason is there to do this to someone that has done jack 2 u just to impress ur boys? this kind of homo behavoiur really digusts me.

yesteday i saw one of a girl being flykiked by a group of about 6 boys and was really upset....what's that about?

how can it make them feel good to intimidate 1 girl and attack her and theres about 6 of them?

i can usually speculate why most thigs happen or have some sort of idea, but this one has got me baffed.

why would ne1 keep this and pass it around on their phone? my bro found it funny until i reminded him that could be me or his gyal it was happening to.

i know its unlikely that ne1 on this site is likely to go on like that but i was just wondering if some1 can explain WHAT could be the motvation for these 'people'.

has it happened to u or anyone u know?

Blackthought
Member

Posted: Tuesday December 14th, 2004 14:56 -
Reply
I have seen them, in fact I have them on my phone, just like u I was shockingly surprise, must admit the first time I saw, I bust out into laughing, but "it was of a man sleeping on the bus", I haven't seen a female geting beating up.

On the serious note its quiet sadistic thing to do, I can't imagine any of my family member having that been done too. Those boys that are doing that kinda of things to girls for fun, obviously don't have a female in there life that they respect, and God forbid they are the ones that probably grow beating there female partners.

Posted: Tuesday December 14th, 2004 15:44
I have seen it too (on peoples phones) and quite a few different ones. All people going about their business and a group of schoolkids comes up and one slaps them followed by laughing.
From chatting to peoples lil brothers its getting more and more popular.

Posted: Tuesday December 14th, 2004 15:48 -
respec Blackthought, it's funny i hadn't thought of that. when you are raised to respect people around you you tend to think that everyone has morals, is deep down decent and does't cross those kinda lines. i would ask people not to keep those sickos on your phone, cos in a in their sick minds thats their claim to fame.

this reminds me of this black kid, maybe 10 or 11, who zipped by me on the street the other day, stole a grapefruit off a fruitstand (okay no biggie), and then subsequently hurled it with all his strength at a nearby sleeping bum (also black), hitting him in the head, and yelling "wake up motherfucker!" then running down the street laughing. I wanted to wring that little bastard's neck...

This phenomenon is really fucking stupid and lame, to the point where I am almost distracted from the egregious homonym abuse in the quoted thread. I want to shake those little bastards until they bleed, then give the people complaining about it spelling lessons.

The worst thing is this isn't something you can lay at the door of big media. It's a product of all that "democratic", "bottom-up", peer-to-peer media that I'm normally so enthusiastic about.

Actually that link makes me totally depressed. (and disinclined to go back to the UK) :-(

Then I discovered hip hop. I learned from listening to hip hop that women were to be referred to as bitches and hoes, and that I was to treat them like the inferior sub-humans they are. I used bitches for sex and status, and when I was finished I would throw them away. This is how black men relate to bitches as well.

Just recently I realized that I am gay.