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styky
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 Posted: 01/ 18/ 07 10:31 am Post subject: Glorifying the gun by: Warren Kinsella |
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Glorifying the gun
Warren Kinsella
National Post
Thursday, January 18, 2007
CREDIT: Reuters, Universal Music Group
Rapper 50 Cent, shown on the cover of his album, was once shot at nine times.
If you believe artists should strive to improve the human condition, don't go looking on the Internet for NWA's 1991 music video, Alwayz Into Somethin. It is only likely to leave you feeling depressed.
NWA was short for Niggaz With Attitude, one of the pioneers of the now-crowded genre known as "gangsta rap." Alwayz Into Somethin has been described as one of the most violent music videos ever made.
A bloody store holdup kicks off the video, and a bloodier gang shootout ends it. In between, NWA's members point guns at the screen and fire at the viewer. "I got 44 ways of getting' paid," snarls Eazy E, holding up a .44 calibre handgun. "Sittin' in my lap as I roll off the Compton blocks ? So I grab the nine and the clip, and go to murder motherfu--ers at night ? " and so on. Such lyrics have become a cliche of the genre, but were then seen (and still should be seen) as shockingly violent.
After a while, the violence in such music almost denudes one of feeling. As with much of Hollywood, it serves up violence as entertainment, and glorifies gun culture. Does it have real- life implications?
There are plenty of studies to suggest it does. One 1995 University of North Carolina research project, which examined "deleterious effects of rap music," exposed control groups of young men to violent and non-violent videos. Those shown the violent material "expressed greater acceptance of the use of violence [and] reported a higher probability that they would engage in violence." Many other studies have reached similar conclusions.
Rodrigo Bascunan -- a co-owner of the foremost Canadian hip hop magazine, Pound -- is not one to argue with the social scientists. While writing a fascinating new book with co-author Christian Pearce -- Enter The Babylon System: Unpacking Gun Culture From Samuel Colt to 50 Cent -- Bascunan heard the same excuses, repeatedly, from record company executives; and from hip hop artists themselves.
"When it served them, they would say that they were role models, and that they have positive influence," says Bascunan, who lives in Toronto, and resembles a rap artist himself. "And when it was going to be used in some negative manner, it became: 'Oh no, it's just entertainment. You need to raise your own kids.' But you can't have it both ways."
In the soon-to-be-released book, the authors avoid whitewashing the culture they write about in their popular magazine. "Few would deny that rap music plays a role in the problem with guns -- especially not us," the pair
writes. "[But] whatever blame is due some emcees for gun violence, at least as much is due outside of hip hop."
Among those that bear blame, they write, are gun manufacturers, governments and media companies that "take financial advantage of a profound fascination with the image of guns."
Enter The Babylon System -- which takes its title from a 1979 Bob Marley lyric, decrying those who "suck the blood of the sufferers" -- is a gripping compendium of hip hop's "fascination with the image of guns." For example, a list is provided of nearly 60 rappers whose names refer to guns, like Three Glock, or AK-47. One chart details 17 rap songs with the word "Glock" in their title. Another one
lists 13 songs titled, simply, "Bang Bang." It is simultaneously riveting and repulsive.
So, does hip hop deserve to be censored, as Tipper Gore and others famously proposed in the mid- 1980s, when the gangsta rap genre was scandalizing middle America? Bascunan opposes that, pointing out that censorship will simply make violent hip hop seem more like an outlaw culture and therefore more attractive to the white suburban males who listen to it the most.
The issue became somewhat more than hypothetical in Toronto this week, when local rapper Alias Donmillion pleaded guilty to three firearms charges and was sentenced to more than two years' imprisonment. Alias -- with a new album, a new single and a new video in rotation on Much Music -- pleaded guilty to firing a .380 calibre semi-automatic handgun on a downtown street. When caught by police, he had the gun, spent shell casings and almost 11 grams of crack. It was, he told a reporter over a phone line at the Don Jail, a "dumb" thing to do.
Of that there is no doubt. But when Donmillion gets out of jail and heads to the studio to record his next album, will he confess his dumbness and decry drug-and-gun gangsta culture? Or will he bask in his real-life criminal bona fides and turn his incarceration into a NWA style gangland epic? I think we all know the answer.
- Warren Kinsella blogs for the Post and at warrenkinsella.com.
source
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 homeandnativeland
Joined: 02 Feb 2006 Total posts: 3829 Location: Ontario Age: 40 Gender: Male
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| Posted: 01/ 18/ 07 1:18 pm Post subject: Re: Glorifying the gun by: Warren Kinsella |
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| styky wrote: | Glorifying the gun
Warren Kinsella
National Post
Thursday, January 18, 2007
CREDIT: Reuters, Universal Music Group
Rapper 50 Cent, shown on the cover of his album, was once shot at nine times.
If you believe artists should strive to improve the human condition, don't go looking on the Internet for NWA's 1991 music video, Alwayz Into Somethin. It is only likely to leave you feeling depressed.
NWA was short for Niggaz With Attitude, one of the pioneers of the now-crowded genre known as "gangsta rap." Alwayz Into Somethin has been described as one of the most violent music videos ever made.
A bloody store holdup kicks off the video, and a bloodier gang shootout ends it. In between, NWA's members point guns at the screen and fire at the viewer. "I got 44 ways of getting' paid," snarls Eazy E, holding up a .44 calibre handgun. "Sittin' in my lap as I roll off the Compton blocks ? So I grab the nine and the clip, and go to murder motherfu--ers at night ? " and so on. Such lyrics have become a cliche of the genre, but were then seen (and still should be seen) as shockingly violent.
After a while, the violence in such music almost denudes one of feeling. As with much of Hollywood, it serves up violence as entertainment, and glorifies gun culture. Does it have real- life implications?
There are plenty of studies to suggest it does. One 1995 University of North Carolina research project, which examined "deleterious effects of rap music," exposed control groups of young men to violent and non-violent videos. Those shown the violent material "expressed greater acceptance of the use of violence [and] reported a higher probability that they would engage in violence." Many other studies have reached similar conclusions.
Rodrigo Bascunan -- a co-owner of the foremost Canadian hip hop magazine, Pound -- is not one to argue with the social scientists. While writing a fascinating new book with co-author Christian Pearce -- Enter The Babylon System: Unpacking Gun Culture From Samuel Colt to 50 Cent -- Bascunan heard the same excuses, repeatedly, from record company executives; and from hip hop artists themselves.
"When it served them, they would say that they were role models, and that they have positive influence," says Bascunan, who lives in Toronto, and resembles a rap artist himself. "And when it was going to be used in some negative manner, it became: 'Oh no, it's just entertainment. You need to raise your own kids.' But you can't have it both ways."
In the soon-to-be-released book, the authors avoid whitewashing the culture they write about in their popular magazine. "Few would deny that rap music plays a role in the problem with guns -- especially not us," the pair
writes. "[But] whatever blame is due some emcees for gun violence, at least as much is due outside of hip hop."
Among those that bear blame, they write, are gun manufacturers, governments and media companies that "take financial advantage of a profound fascination with the image of guns."
Enter The Babylon System -- which takes its title from a 1979 Bob Marley lyric, decrying those who "suck the blood of the sufferers" -- is a gripping compendium of hip hop's "fascination with the image of guns." For example, a list is provided of nearly 60 rappers whose names refer to guns, like Three Glock, or AK-47. One chart details 17 rap songs with the word "Glock" in their title. Another one
lists 13 songs titled, simply, "Bang Bang." It is simultaneously riveting and repulsive.
So, does hip hop deserve to be censored, as Tipper Gore and others famously proposed in the mid- 1980s, when the gangsta rap genre was scandalizing middle America? Bascunan opposes that, pointing out that censorship will simply make violent hip hop seem more like an outlaw culture and therefore more attractive to the white suburban males who listen to it the most.
The issue became somewhat more than hypothetical in Toronto this week, when local rapper Alias Donmillion pleaded guilty to three firearms charges and was sentenced to more than two years' imprisonment. Alias -- with a new album, a new single and a new video in rotation on Much Music -- pleaded guilty to firing a .380 calibre semi-automatic handgun on a downtown street. When caught by police, he had the gun, spent shell casings and almost 11 grams of crack. It was, he told a reporter over a phone line at the Don Jail, a "dumb" thing to do.
Of that there is no doubt. But when Donmillion gets out of jail and heads to the studio to record his next album, will he confess his dumbness and decry drug-and-gun gangsta culture? Or will he bask in his real-life criminal bona fides and turn his incarceration into a NWA style gangland epic? I think we all know the answer.
- Warren Kinsella blogs for the Post and at warrenkinsella.com.
source |
Just lovely how whoren Kinsmella lumps innocent hunters and other law abiding gun owners with 'gansta's'.
Firearms are a wonderful tool of freedom and self sufficiency. I'm sure the police that apprehend these criminals use them. |
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| Gregor Gender: Unknown
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| Posted: 01/ 18/ 07 2:03 pm Post subject: Re: Glorifying the gun by: Warren Kinsella |
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| styky wrote: | | Rapper 50 Cent, shown on the cover of his album, was once shot at nine times. |
A music critic perhaps? Listening to Mr Kinsella probably has the same effect. |
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littleharbour
Gender: Unknown
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| Posted: 01/ 18/ 07 2:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Why do I get the impression that Kinsella would wet his pants if he ever had to so much as hold a gun? |
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Akimoya
Location: Hamilton, ON Gender: Unknown
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| Posted: 01/ 19/ 07 3:24 pm Post subject: |
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