Physician, Heal Your Damn Self

actually Larry, Death Row records, while owned by dre and suge knight, was part of the interscope group, distibuted by no less a white mogul than David Geffen among other white partners.

I wanted to acknowledge in this thread that there is a need to address the power of the words and images in some hiphop music, and in some of the comedy and other entertainment forms. I wanted to say as a black man that I see the need for the same kind of furor that all kinds of people showed toward Imus to be directed at some of the poisonous, negative, seamy, misogynistic and yes oh-so-popular things that keep getting a pass.

I've been wondering why no one's grabbed Howard Stern yet for his opinion.

And now a musical interlude

Looking back on when I Was a little nappy headed boy Then my only worry Was for Christmas what would be my toy Even though we sometimes Would not get a thing We were happy with the Joy the day would bring Sneaking out the back door To hang out with those hoodlum friends of mine Greeted at the back door With "Boy thought I told you not to go outside", Tryin your best to bring the Water to your eyes Thinkin' it might stop her From whoopin' your behind I wish those days could come back once more Why did those days ev-er have to go I wish those days could come back once more Why did those days ev-er have to go 'Cause I love them so Brother says he's tellin 'bout you playin' doctor with that girl Just don't tell I'll give you Anything you want in this whole wide world Mama gives you money for Sunday school You trade yours for candy after church is through Smokin' cigarettes and writing something nasty on the wall (you nasty boy) Teacher sends you to the principal's office down the wall You grow up and learn that kinda thing ain't right But while you were doin it-it sure felt outta sight I wish those days could come back once more Why did those days ev-er have to go I wish those days could come back once more Why did those days ev-er have to go

That song's been running through my head lately (probably more due to the first and second lines than anything else).

I've been wondering why no one's grabbed Howard Stern yet for his opinion.
I've been wondering why these young ladies don't just tell Imus, etc. to go scratch, that those people's opinions don't mean anything to them?
I've been troubled by the rush to victimhood, and the quashing of free (yet of course objectionable) speech.
I've been troubled by advertisers essentially dictating what ends up on the airwaves.
I've been troubled by how quickly this all escalated, 2 weeks suspension to one firing, to a second.
I've been troubled by the free (albeit negative) publicity that's been tossed around for people (Imus, Sharpton, etc.) who I generally don't think about at all. How'd they end up the lead story, ahead of the Iraqi parliament building being bombed, or the NJ Governor getting into an accident and a million other things?
I've been troubled by the belief that the word "ho" is somehow an acceptable alternative to, I dunno, "Miss"? "Bitch"? "You female who I won't bother to know the name of so I'll insult you sexually"?

I've been thinking about synonyms. What does nappy-headed mean, anyway? It means curly-haired, which, so far as I'm aware, is no insult. But ho just means prostitute. It has no neutral synonym. I think that's the big insult here.

I've been watching this story coopted by lots of different folks with all sorts of different agendas, both here and in the news and sports and elsewhere. It gets bigger and bigger and takes on a life of its own, like an errant balloon at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Huge and menacing-looking, but ultimately with little substance and easy destroyed with almost no effort.

PS That horrible gangsta rapper I quoted above was Stevie Wonder. Circa '76.

Lemme take a moment to clarify something. There are a lot of side issues that keep threatening to entwine what I see as the main issue I'm trying to address. Nothing wrong with the entwining except if it chokes the life out of the issue. I know there is conflict going on about the fairness of singling out Imus as related to other shock jocks, or as related to his 30 prior years of arguably worse things said.

I know there is a juicy rant always bursting to break forth about the hypocrisy of Sharpton and Jackson, and how they aren't qualified to be anyone's moral arbiters. And I know there is the temptation (I'm not immune to it) to make it all about who is to blame more, the white folks or the black folks - who's profiting more from the corruption, and who is leading who in the wrong direction.

I only point out the white bigwigs in the rap industry and the majority of suburban whites buying hiphop music to counter the sometimes bitter voices trying to point blame at blacks, saying "Look how they denigrate themselves." I don't point that out to blame "the white man" This is important - if anything, I'm hoping we can see that we all will rise or fall together in this "coarsening of the culture" issue.

IMO, any attempts to point across the racial divide at this or that political opportunist or this or that corporate boss is not only doomed to spiral down into a useless soup of noise, but it is missing the point of this thread.

I wanted to acknowledge in this thread that there is a need to address the power of the words and images in some hiphop music, and in some of the comedy and other entertainment forms. I wanted to say as a black man that I see the need for the same kind of furor that all kinds of people showed toward Imus to be directed at some of the poisonous, negative, seamy, misogynistic and yes oh-so-popular things that keep getting a pass.

I would be so interested to see what kind of change could come about if all that energy (and I refuse to believe it was all just simple market-driven activity)could be focused on those parts of our "entertainment" of which I'm speaking.

It's late at night, and I'm in a good mood because its Friday, and maybe I'm just too damn idealistic for my age, and for this time in our country,
and for the reality of human nature as it actually is. But dammit I'd like to hope it doesn't all just have to be the same righteously indignant "look-how-Elvis-is-corrupting-our-youth" crap. And I'd like to hope that it doesn't all have to devolve into just another pissing contest about who is more to blame. It's 1 in the morning, and I'd like to hope.

There will come a time when the kids...not all of them but a great deal of them.... will feel sheepish about the kind of seamy hip hop that is popular in the top 40 everyday world and they will abandon it... just as we abandoned big hair, aqua net, and now only yell "we don't need no water let the mother f*cker burn" once a year at the holiday party.

hip Hop, like metal, and original corrupting rock and roll is supposed to be rebellious and in the face of the grown ups and society in general.
It's cathartic and allows kids to exprsss normal angst and anger. I'm not saying it's good, or that racial and demeaning lyrics are okay, but they are not unusual in one form or another through time.

As I stated earlier, my biggest objection is that it just gets stupider and stupider. No imagery, no wordsmithing, no cleverness.

There's a hell of a jump from Dylan, Lennon and Gaye to death metal and ludacris. The dumbing down of a culture is historically one of the watershed moments in the beginning of it's demise.

Having said that, I make a living playing the eternal naughty rocker for my aging peers so I guess I'm a hypocritical prick.