>-do blk ppl bare *some* responsiblity for willingly playing
>into the traps set by the larger society? Like glorifying
>seliing drugs when we know where the road will eventually lead
>to. To a lot of our youth "doing a prison bid" is a badge of
>honor.though..and garners more respect in some instances
>amongst their peers than getting a college degree..

We just collectively gave it up to the bang bang, shoot em up? Perhaps we are just genetically deficient and resort to crabs in a barrel behavior when put together like ofay wants to claim that we are.

You've got kids in Brownsville Brooklyn who look at Manhattan like it's a mythical place they've never been to when its less then ten miles away; the system is rigged.

I love how you make the logical leap of, 'It's mainstream hip-hop' but don't want to acknowledge the BIGGER things in place besides who controls what you see on the racks at Walmart (or the front page of itunes). You say 'willingly' as if suddenly the kid who's four generations DEEP in the projects with no parents who graduated high school (forget college) is supposed to become all by the bootstraps at the age of ten(because by the late teen years its probably too late) to perhaps enroll himself in a school two hours away by public transportation, cook his own lunches, forcibly re-engage teachers that have already written him or her off because they are black, etc.

They are traps for a reason, and while us talented tenth'ers can sit back on our macbooks and talk about how people in the hood just don't get it and should improve their itunes playlists, the problem is MUCH deeper then that. 70's was chock full of pro-black music and black folks were in dire situations.

And honestly, it's not as if its the g-unit gangster rap era anyway, sure you have your chief keefs and shmurdas but you also have your drakes(who ironically enough, many old heads see as soft), Kanye's, and even fuckers like Young Thug if you really listen is more on that 'party and bullshit' a la Whodini then MURDER MURDER KILL KILL, which, despite your 'WE HAD A BALANCE, LOLZ'* came in under OUR generations watch, lol. The music on the radio today is LESS murderous, but as frivolous(cause it's not like niggas like LL was gonna win humanitarian of the year), as what was popping when radio finally embraced hip-hop.