The Gangster Rap Game

50 Cent is a bitch. If I see him, I’m gonna slap him around for setting a bad example.

Think I’m being boastful? Let me explain: Whatever kind of tough guy 50 Cent was before he got into the rap game no longer matters. His former lifestyle is now nothing more than a distant memory; just one more thing to put on his rap resume. Now, 50 is an entertainer, a millionaire entertainer but nothing more than somebody who shows up on stage and draws a crowd . . . just like those poodles wearing tutus and clowns at the circus.

Currently, so-called rap thugs are on a crime spree in Kansas City. Stupidly, the local news is trying to connect the rising murder/crime rate to the local thugs who hide behind hip-hop. I guess blaming a form of music is easier than talking about things like inherent racism, the manufacturing base leaving the U.S., the technology gap, etc., etc. I know I’d throw away all of my Weezer CD’s if 20-something white guys would cut it out with those scruffy hair cuts and pretending to care what women think. Anyway, the truth is that the same dirtbags who are killing each other in this town while listening to and participating in rap music would also be killing each other to polka music if the sweet sounds of Poland were the current rage. The dirty little secret that local rap enthusiasts don’t like talking about is that many of the KC gangster rappers are financed by the drug trade and other criminal activities; and these activities are far more likely to lead to violence than any stupid lyrics. Think I’m speculating about the locals involved in the gangster rap game? Call it speculation if you like, but what occupation affords a Cadillac Escalade but not enough money to move out of mom’s basement? Talk to a few local gangster rappers, as I have, and vague, mumbled details about day jobs will be all you’ll get from these usually verbose lyricists.

Still, low income black people killing each other is not a tragedy in KC; if it was someone would have put forth a more serious effort to stop it years ago. The real tragedy is that every day middle class, White, Black and Hispanic young adults support this silliness with not only their dollars for CDs and merchandise but also with devoted adoration that has lifted rap music beyond a form of expression and turned it to an iconic lifestyle. And even that statement isn’t completely fair, because the gangster rap that is being blamed for the current crime wave is such a ghettoized genre of hip-hop that it is all but ignored by mainstream rap fans. In fact, the commercialization and trivialization of mainstream hip-hop makes it worse still that gangster rap is an element associated with recent crimes and murders around town as KC slouches through the summer to its deadliest year in a decade.