[lbo-talk] Rap and Detroit

Leigh Meyers leighcmeyers at gmail.com
Fri Apr 29 10:06:27 PDT 2005


---- Original Message ---- From: joanna To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Sent: Friday, April 29, 2005 8:40 AM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Rap and Detroit


> Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
>
>> This is precisely what is so appealing in gangsta rap - it is white
>> or middle class kids using blacks to do something they would not
>> dare doing in their own name - piss of their parents and authority
>> figures. It is so obvious that is pathetic that seemingly
>> intelligent people cannot see it.
>>
> Wait. The attitudes do matter. I agree about white/mc kids and that
> gangsta rap is built around that market.
> Still, there's a diff between violence described in blues/country
> music and the violence described in some forms of rap.
> The "civilized remorse" is not pretend, it's real.
>
> Joanna

I would suspect MC kids are just echoing their *parents* lack of "civilized remorse" for wars, and poverty and... [enter favorite issue here]. The kids are alright, they think they are supporting black artistic culture, and indeed, when they attend a KRS-1 or BDP show, they probably are.

The first time I played Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" for one of the local kids, he smiled at me and said, "... we'll work on the webcast.", with a sneer, and promptly went home to add it to his music collection via the internet.

It's the adults that are AFU, sellouts. If you think middle class kids don't know that ... well... You (not you personally, Joanna) must be a typically clueless middle class parent.

" I gave him/her everything he/she wanted.. I don't understand what's wrong?" --anonymous middle class Santa Cruz parent(biologically only) acting as role model for a child in America's shallow, callow consumer culture.

Leigh



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