I grew up in a Christian home and a minister as my mother who feared that Hip-Hop would corrupt her children and forbid the likes of music videos on our television screens and “devil music” to blast from our radios so as much as I tried to immerse myself in the culture, my upbringing was the biggest hindrance.
Needless to say that fateful Monday morning, the weekend after March 14 when Biggie Smalls had been shot with no hopes of finding the killer, speculation being the biggest suspect, I didn’t know that one of my favorite, new found rappers had been killed the Friday before.
As I walked into art class just as the tardy bell rung, still a fresh eyed freshmen trying to piece together my place in Hip-Hop, I was stunned to hear the news so many had been afforded to hear three days before I did.
“Did you hear?”
“Did I hear what?”
“They shot Biggie. He’s dead.”
I looked confused, a little dumbfounded of course because clearly I had not learned the three day old news until the top of a rainy morning when I should’ve been able to watch the news reports when it actually happened. I felt cheated because this type of information is what I should know if I was going to truly call myself a ‘fan of Hip-Hop.”
What was even more shocking is that just some months before Afeni Shakur had just sent the body of her son through a crematorium as a result of the same crime that took the life of Hip Hop’s ultimate bad boy. My thirteen year old brain couldn’t fathom how this could happen, again.
And, as we soon commemorate the death of Biggie in a couple of days I think about the progress we’ve made in Hip-Hop and the question becomes, have we grown out of the violence ridden messages we send to our youths in 16 bars?
I guess one could argue that we’ve certainly come a long way since the inception of gangsta rap and the promotion of gang violence in our communities, but how far do we have to go?
Well, we could ask C-List rapper Young Buck because after this past weekend, if it had not been for his speedy response to a drive by shooting, we would be commemorating his death this same time next year.
It seems the rapper had been out last night and after leaving a venue a car pulled next to him and opened fire leaving his car with proof of eleven shots that injured one of his passengers. Luckily, he and his other passenger escaped with no injuries and will live to see another day, but ultimately the scenes we reminisce in movies, news, and lyrics of drive-bys and club shootings are not our past, but our present.
About three weeks ago I got a text from a coworker with little details about one of her closest students falling victim to a drive by in a neighborhood close by my high school alma mater. What’s even worse is the young man fell victim to a drive by, not in a motor vehicle, but a 10 speed bicycle.
In an economy where even the middle class is struggling to keep up with car payments, increase in gas prices, and a hike in insurance rates, it seems the economically disadvantaged will partake in the message of violence by any means necessary. It is risky behavior to drive by and shoot or even shoot in the open and then jump in the car that would be labeled, ‘the getaway,’ but it says a great deal when you will risk your life to open fire on a bicycle. If the police had been called that young man would have been way easier to track down than if he were in a vehicle and so it speaks toward the value that our children have of their own lives, much less the value they have for others’ lives.
So, as we commemorate the death of Biggie Smalls, one of the kings of Hip-Hop, we need to evaluate how we can make a difference in the minds of our youth who listen to lyrics that promote “bicycle drive bys” and how we can change how our youth look at life and its value.
J. Prince, Princepality 14
Princepality 