17 year old German exchange student shot by home owner in Montana

Lol another racist statement brought to you by Lippy
Well gang and thug culture existed long before slaves were even free but the current thug/gang culture has been inspired more by Italian mob culture and seriously what does that have to do with what we are talking about

 

You are certainly entitled to your opinion but thug culture is glamorized...black youth imitate what they see as cool and popular...we talk all the time about how a style of dress is easily mistaken and then labeled "thug" it really is no different than the white supremacists that adopted the "skinhead" look...it comes down to perception...kids today need better role models to imitate and look up to...

 

Unfortunately, so many of the ones that appear to be good role models end up being bad role models, when news leaks out about them embezzling money, paying for prostitutes, what have you.

We just have to be present in our children's lives and teach them right from wrong and try to live up to those standards for them.

 

Tupac gave 'thug life' street cred it never had before that reached all the way to the suburbs. For Black folk to say that 'thug' was unfairly put upon us by White culture need to understand what we're doing when we make a dude like this a rap icon.

He becomes WE. And we unfortunately become 'they'.

We endorse and embrace wanna be gangbangers because of their 'art', then don't understand why others can't separate the rapper, his race, his lyrics and his tats from Black people in general.

It would be no different if Italians as a whole embraced mafioso culture.
Most of them don't and hate it when you make assumptions about organized crime and their particular families.

Like everyone Italian knows someone connected.

Just like every Black person knows someone who's been locked up or played a professional sport.:axe:

 

THIS^

 

Saying Tupac was a wanna be gangster is as ignorant as saying that Robert De Niro is a wanna be gangster because he plays a gangster in the movies. FYI there are white artists in the music industry that are tattooed junkies. It would be very unfair and ignorant to assume that all white people are the same as someone tripping on LSD in a rock band. Get real
[YOUTUBE]Ob5dYR-GTRI[/YOUTUBE] According to your logic UC Berkley is glorifying gang bangers and criminal activity. Tupac was an artist simple as that.

 

You saved me a post. You know what else makes thug culture cool to kids? Movies with a shit ton of gin violence but no one is holding the cast of Expendables responsible for decades of depicting that shit. I wonder why.

 

You think black youth are the only ones who imitate shit from media? You think the violence perptuated in the low income areas is inspired by thug culture? Read up on the drug wars then speak again please

 

West coast rap in the 1990s definitely blurred the lines between real gangbangers and rap artists.

Tupac glorified and glamorized that lifestyle, even if in his heart he never wanted to be a Crip.

It's not a coincidence that it's alleged he was killed in a gang hit paid for by Suge Knight.

Robert Deniro never represented himself as living his life like a mafioso once he left the movie set, unlike Tupac.

The man had that shit tattooed on his stomach. Forgive us who didn't understand Tupac was just trying to be 'in style' instead of keeping it real.

If Tupac was only pretending to be gangsta for record sales, double shame on him.

When you dress like a whore, don't be surprised when people mistake you for one.

 

What about white and Hispanic youth. Why is this a black problem?

 

Are you high right now? So thug culture falls on rap music not the gang and drug cultures that preceded it?
It's not like before Pac did music dudes were wearing church clothes everywhere. Put down the pipe

 

The broad impact of rap music dwarfs anything put out by the movie industry. It even coined it's own phrase to demonstrate how pervasive it is; hip-hop CULTURE. Not just as music, but a lifestyle.

Last I checked Schartzenegger and Stallone weren't cultural icons in the 'hood, Black or White.

We've had this convo before but when the biggest cultural icons in much of the Black community are gangsta rappers, considering the incarceration rate of Black youth for non-violent drug offenses(SELLING), I don't think it's a stretch to draw a logical correlation between the music we're feeding ourselves and it's influence on people making bad life decisions.

It's like living in a house where the parents have porn DVDs and mags laying all around in full view in front of their kids.

Don't be surprised when little Johnny and Suzy are losing their virginity at 12 years old and both are parents before age 18.

 

Are we? Thought this was a German kid getting shot my bad

 

That's suck lazy thinking. So how do you explain thug and gag cultures in Latin America and Eastern Europe? IT'S POVERTY NOT MUSIC THAT FUELS THIS SHIT

 

The biggest selling segment of rap music since the early 1990s has been gangsta rap. It's been that way for over two decades.

Before gangsta rap Black music wasn't preoccupied with telling the the trials and tribulations of slinging rock on the corner and how hard it was to make a grip with 5-0 on your back.

You should check out the steady increase in the incarceration of Black youth since the 1990s.

Is it all on gangsta rap??? No.

But gangsta rap has become a blueprint for a criminal lifestyle in the 'hood.

If you are a gangbanger in South Central or a dope dealer in Detroit, you sure as hell aren't listening to John Legend or Dido.

If you're already at risk like many Black youth are from birth in most economically disadvantaged neighborhoods, some rap music IMO acts like an accelerant. It didn't start the fire, but it makes that fire burn hotter faster.

It's just a bad formula when an artist who popularizes a criminal lifestyle is one of the biggest cultural icons in the 'hood.

 

So how is Drake such a popular rapper then?

 

The culture of poverty in Eastern Europe and Latin America is not the same culture of poverty in the U.S.

American poverty ain't got shit to do with poverty in the rest of the world.

A mere shift in the focus for many inner city Black youth towards getting good grades in HS and going to a 2 to 4 year college ANYWHERE, would immediately halt the descent of the Black community.

Focusing only on academics in Latin America or Eastern Europe isn't really going to do much to change your life outcomes because of the more rigid class barriers.

When you're born a crime statistic, listening to a former(or embellished) dope dealer's lyrics about what life was like as a dope dealer isn't really a winning life strategy.

 

Drake is an exception in the industry especially over the last 25 years. You know that.

Gangsta rap is still the largest selling category in rap music and has been ever since NWA came on the scene.

 

Just so you know, there's also course on Lady Gaga at the University of South Carolina. The professor is a huge fan of hers, which I have no doubt so is Berkley's teacher of Tupac.

Which is why we should separate the artist, whom we truly love with his often brilliant lyrics and mind, from the 'thug-life' influence he had on, or better yet, has on his followers.

So on the Tupac issue, I think Andreboba makes a point on his embracing the life-style..He also did have multiple incidences of run-ins..

In fact, just yesterday, Suge came out commenting on Diddy having been the one who murdered him......

"Bitch ass Puffy can get him a muthafukka star (on the Walk of Fame), and every rat in the world say he's the one who killed Tupac, or had him shot."

You really don't see Deniro tied up in all that 'extra' shit.

---
*(ps: Lorenz Tate killed that role, I wonder how Tupac would have fared in it...he would have been great I bet)

 

On the cover of the album Makaveli Tupac had a picture of himself hanging on a cross. Does that make him a wanna be Jesus?? No one may know the full story on why Tupac chose the tats he did but I'm sure that I am at least partially correct by saying he did it because that is how he felt that America would view him anyway being a bm. That's what artists do they express themselves though art. Was he correct in his assumption? IDK. One thing is for sure is that racism and stereotypes existed long before he got the tats. People don't view black men as a menace because of Tupac.

The movie menace to society was about a young man named Kane who thought the only future he could possibly have was in the streets selling drugs. Guess what? There were people smoking crack and real life examples of drug dealers before the movie came out. :smt031