Jason Whitlock column on Taylor

[djnemo65]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

No but it has since glorified it. It promotes the types of behavior that have shaped a culture of violence and crime. I fail to see how so many people are blind to this. Whether one likes hip-hop for its musical value or not it is ludicrcous to me that they can't see this.

And to argue that the problem is solely based in economics is to ignore evidence to the contrary. I doubt you'll find anyone who would argue the the problem BEGAN as a socioeconomic imbalance. And most would surely agree that the socioeconomic disparities remain a strong force. But the culture of violence and crime is driven by many factors. One of which is the reality that in the black community hip-hop glorifies it. Maybe hip-hop was born out of this "struggle" and simply reflects what has grown naturally but it has become a driving force in promoting the longevity of this negative culture and something needs to be done about that.

There's no doubt that a lot of Hiphop music glorifies the worst criminal aspects of contemporary urban life (obviously not all Hiphop, or even most of it, I would argue) but I disagree that it's a driving force, however you are defining that. America is a violent media culture, from our thirst for action movies and realistic first person shooters to torture-porn movies like Saw, to single out Hiphop is absurd. As Jay Z so eloquently says on his new album, "Scarface the movie did more than Scarface the rapper to me/ Still that ain't to blame for half the shit that's happened to me."

By the way, violent crime has actually declined in urban communities over the last 10 years (in spite of increased media coverage). Commensurate with the continued commercial rise of Hiphop. So again, I just am not convinced that negative Hiphop is a driving force in crime.