Well first of all bob, you'll notice the 10,000 lb chain around his neck.  That's his bling, not his belt buckle.  He he...that would be a cooler belt buckle.

Also if anyone has seen the Sopranos you'll remember when the rapper hired a mafioso to shoot him to get street cred...like 50 cent.  I wonder if this is the same thing.

To make a commentary on rap and black culture:  Rap has hurt black people more than anything I can think of (besides white people that is).  First of all, it gives younge, black males a desire to become easily rich and support the ghetto.  I can't tell you how people black males I know (not THAT many) who strive to get into the rap biz.  I shake my head everytime I hear them say it.  Do they really expect to make it?  I mean look how many rappers are out there, and come on, most of them, have as much talent as a beanstalk.  You can tell the generic rappers from the "real" ones by their music videos.  If they just have their entire neighborhood behind them bobbing up and down and a few girls and cars...they are just the cookie cutter image. 

Second of all rap hurts black women.  More black women today are getting higher education and better paying jobs.  This makes it harder to find a black male with similar characteristics.  This is why more black women are either not marrying or dating outside their "race" (only one race, the human race, but I use the generic term).  The idea of "I'm going to be a famous rapper like Jay-Z or 2Pac, or Puffy" is as remote as saying "I'm going to be a professional baseball/football/basketball/etc palyer".  Even if you ARE a decent player, that won't mean you'll get signed right out of high school.  That means while the black female is continuing college, the black males are sitting around waiting for their "big break".

Third, rap hurts the image of black men.  The gangsta lifestyle is not something to be proud of.  Look at the rappers today?  Are they still from "da streets"?  Hmm the diamonds, the booze, the cars?  No, they make money off the image of the ghetto and from the people who live there (although 90% of rap is bought by white college kids).  They do nothing to go back to their ghetto block and start after school programs or give money to churches or school or the YMCA.  They spend their money on themselves because "they've earned it and they were owed something for their hard lives".  When whites and blacks still have stereotypes that hurt us both, rap gives moronic whites another berage of ammo to fuel their racism.  The gangsta lifestyle, the "ghetto, black" talk, the guns, the cars, the greed.  The idea of, this is what every black person strives to be and thinks.  The black community hurts itself (just like the Arab) for not speaking out and condoning this music that building up the lifestyle of shooting, drugs, booze, loose women, and death.

My last point is that it hurts women, esp black women.  Look at any music video and you will see the girl with nothing on with a nice back basically treated like an animal or worse an object.  You have them as servents in Flava's vids, you have them as dogs on actual leashes in Snoops vids, and in all of them women are not held to be people of respect let alone people.  The women in the video are exploited, the women who idolize these women are too, and so are the women who still like the rappers.  These women go to the clubs and let the rappers do whatever they want just for the fame or the money or the booze.  The words "skeet skeet skeet" are something that has even lowered the standard of women to outside world.  I won't go into what it is because I'm pretty sure we all know what it means.  Not to mention, the independent, black woman who gets her college degree, gets a real job, has to contend with these images and striving not to be like them and make people see either her as just a good worker or her as what black women can accomplish.

I'm not saying all rap is bad and some make good political or social commentary.  I just think it shows you the greed of man, white or black, and the intollerance of both "races".  The black communuity should condem these behaviors (and some do...there's a group at WMU who does so) and these "heroes from the streets" should invest in those same streets to improve them.

Sorry for that diatribe but I just felt like typing that up.

X

Ha, Sony is suing Sony.  That's grand!

-b0b
(...got his morning chuckle.)

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2006/10/20/entertainmen...

I smell the blood of corporate presure.  Well at least those gay people still can't get in.

X
(  )

So, the God of all creation doesn't understand flawed socioeconomic theory?

What happened to omniscience?

-b0b
(...boggles at the supreme arrogance.)

I appologize about the off topicness of this post.

Just wondering, Briney are you graduating soon??  I am curious about who you will work for, any job prospecting?  Do you have any new projects or renders that you want to show us?

I bet he will too

(..leaves it for someone else)

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20630127-1702,00.html

Yep I'm glad those tougher gun laws and buy back progs really worked!