In recent media there has been a lot a talk as relating to
the Sandy Hook massacre and where guns and violence plays a role in our
country. While the Sandy Hook was and still is a major tragedy there has been
major gun violence in our country for a while that I believe has been
overlooked. Chicago, Illinois is a well known city that has helped shaped many
entertainers and even the President of the United States; however Chicago has
turned into the most violent city in the states in what seems like a very short
time. Over the past year Chicago’s gun violence has increased a stunning 66%.
My topic this week is not me talking about how this hasn't received enough
attention (even though it would be a valid point) but rather how people are
handling this situation. Of course since its birth rap music has been seen as
an outlet for violence. The entire culture has been frowned upon and has been pushed
away. Even though there are rap artists and people who represent the culture as
negative that doesn't make the entire thing bad. There have been some rappers
who show the culture for what it really is, positive, but since the outbreaks
between gangs in Chicago rap music again has been pointed to as the scapegoat.
The main rap artists that have been seen as the reason for the violence are
rappers “Chief Keef” a 17 year old rapper who is serving a 60 day sentence in
juvenile detention and “Lil Mouse” a 13 year old rapper who recently signed a
record deal with Young Money (known for putting out rappers such as Drake,
Nicki Minaj, and Lil Wayne). They both recently exploded in the media scene for
negative reasons including possession of illegal firearms (Chief Keef) and for
just simply being a 13 year old boy rapping about things he has no business
with (Lil Mouse). Even though they put rap and hip hop in a bad light without
them and without the music in general there would be no way for kids to speak
about what is happening and we would never know there is crisis in the city of Chicago.
My main thing I want to get into your head is that rap music is not a bad thing
and it tells you a lot when you actually listen to it, I make music but do you
really think I am a bad person? Chicago violence is awful but you can’t just
blame it on rap music and think that you are going to stop it right there. The city
of Chicago and the entire world needs to shed more light on the subject of gun
violence in general and then we can figure out how to stop it.
Please tell me what you think of this problem in the comments.
Please tell me what you think of this problem in the comments.
Watch at your own risk
I completely agree with you on this one Nick. As sad as it seems, people are always trying to find someone to point a finger at and blame. Especially with violence and tragedy, many people want to have something they can be mad at, something they can blame for what has happened. And in this situation, rap music is the victim. You can’t blame a genre of music for gun violence. Now I understand that sometimes what you hear in music will motivate you. I’ve experienced that. I’ve listened to music that pumped me up and motivated me to do well. In the same sense, some lyrics to some songs might motivate some people do some negative things, but notice how it’s all only SOME. And in this case, that “some” is a very small portion of music. So back to as I said, I completely agree with you. This whole story is giving rap a bad reputation that it doesn’t deserve.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very interesting point Nick, I as a fellow musician feel that music is meant to convey a message. To discourage and blame young people for making music expressing their opinion is destroying the one thing that music is really about. Some may consider rap something different from music but its all the same. It saddens me to read that people are doing this to young rappers.
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