(Repost) Internet thugs and online intimidation is (also) tearing apart the black community

Why do we like yelling at people through our phones?

In my last post, I talked about how flexing and self-snitching are damaging the black community beyond repair. However, an online beef (if you can even call it that) between a gangsta rapper and a YouTube blogger has sparked me to write a follow-up post about something I think rivals flexing for the main problems that are holding our community back.

A rapper by the name of Casanova 2x has recently been sending very passive aggressive threats towards DJ Akademiks, a blogger who happens to make opinionated youtube videos. I would love to reference the tweets/Instagram posts, but a lot of them have already been deleted. Which would be smart if not for the fact that the internet remembers everything and the internet also know how to screenshot. To get the full context of the situation, I will point you to Akademiks video explaining the situation, since he screenshotted the tweets/IG posts before Casanova was able to delete them
 
In that video, Akademiks makes a point that gave me the inspiration to write this post. Casanova claims that Akademiks puts out everybody's personal business for everyone to see and it leads to a lot of men getting in trouble. Akademiks counterpoint is twofold: the first point is that he does not put out any information that the rappers themselves does not put out.  The second point is that Akademiks is not gangsta and isn't really intimidated by the threats since he WILL snitch if something was to happen to him.
 
Heres the problem with rappers. Rappers will show themselves doing something that they probably should not be doing,  and then get mad when the blogs report on it. I talked about this in my last post related to Meek Mill. If you do not want to suffer consequences for doing something you should not do, you simply should not put it out there for all your fans (and law enforcement) to see. It's not a hard concept. It shows that most of these rappers actually care far too much about the opinion of the fans and they get very sensitive when someone does not talk about you in a favorable way all the time. Furthermore, even if the blogs reporting on it blow it up more than it normally does, it still doesn’t take away from the fact that if you did not publish it yourself, there would be nothing to report on to get you in trouble…it's very backward thinking that kind of exposes the intelligence level of these so-called gangsta rappers.
 
Which leads me to the second point. Gangsta rappers, regardless of the age, are as dumb as ever. Since the advent of social media, so many rappers seem more and more compelled to talk about how gangsta they are online to people they never met (and never will meet) and how they will do something to someone to get a few likes on their Instagram video. Which leads to them being the main suspect if something does go down….Attacking a media personality online does not give you points with anyone that is actually gangsta and doing crimes. On the topic of gangsta points, let's take a deeper look at Casanova himself.

Many people have told me in my lifetime that real gangster individuals move in silence and more importantly, Real G's don’t get caught. Casanova has been caught. Multiple times. That’s not exactly a gangsta to me, just a dumb criminal. So as an individual that is one unlucky run-in with the hip-hop police away from a lengthy bid in jail, you would think that someone in that kind of position would not be so brash and public with potentially committing a crime. Also, just cause you are off of parole means that you are now free to commit crimes, you are still a felon, my guy.

I'll never understand why people that are supposed to be the toughest dudes feel the need to threaten people online other than that they have no other way to deal with criticism or someone saying unfavorable things they might not like other than to resort to violence, then to delete it. Behavior like this only leads to two things: jail time or death. When outsiders (not black people) look at these gangster rappers, there's already a myriad of stereotypes to choose from to dismiss us all as black people. Constantly threatening each other both in the real world and on social media continues to reinforce these stereotypes and keep us from worrying about issues that really matter because we are all too busy watching grown men yell into their phones all day.

(Repost) Flexing (and Self Snitching) is tearing apart the black community

Flexing is defined as showing off either obscene amounts of money (or just money in general) on the internet in order to gain adoration (or "clout" as it is called) among either your peers or just random people that you don’t know. Flexing can also include talking about something that you did that you feel is noteworthy enough to garner envy or make people angry. In the black community, this has increasingly been the act of self-snitching. It's something that I truly do not understand and I really think is a mental issue that is plaguing our community and destroying it from the inside. Let's begin.

Flexing your money is perplexing for a number of reasons. For normal people, it's just not a wise thing to do. Letting everyone know that you have a lot of money just sends a bat signal to would be robbers and stickup men that you have a lot of cash either on you or where you live. Not to mention it also will bring attention to the Law, which has their own legal implications (more on that later). My theory is that because people that are rich and famous in the community flex, the adoration that they aim towards that celebrity also simultaneously inspires them to want the same adoration from their peers to get from the flex, which inspires them to do the same among their peers.

With famous people in the black community, in particular, Hip-Hop, it makes me scratch my head even more. It's like the fact that they are financially stable for the rest of your life is simply not enough for most, that they must constantly reaffirm the fact that they are rich and let all of the normal folk that they are really rich. I find it ironic because a lot of these people likely spent most of their lives looking at those above them wishing they were in that position and now that they are, they flaunt their riches. The thing is, that the people who truly have wealth do not talk about it or show it. There's no need because the amount of money is so great that it's just an everyday thing. It’s no longer "flexing", its opulence. And with that opulence comes a level of normalcy and privilege that is not afforded to most people in our community because they know that they are not THAT rich. We are not even viewed any different from a normal middle-class black person, but just a consumer with a bigger wallet to spend and give to them. Kanye West said it best: Even if you in a Benz you're still a nigga, in a coupe.

Self-snitching annoys me the most because it shows that all the money in the world doesn’t buy you common sense. It is already bad enough that as an ethnicity,  we are seen for stigmatized for having a propensity to commit crimes, but to then brag about those crimes or to incriminate yourself, intentional or otherwise,  is the ultimate facepalm. At least when you flex what you have, the worst you can expect out of it is envy that may cause you harm in the future. When you self-snitch on yourself, there are legal implications that can and will be used against you. Meek Mill comes to my mind immediately due to his legal issues due to his minor infraction of violating his probation due to riding dirt bikes illegally in New York City and having it recorded. While the infraction itself is relatively minor (Dirt bikes are illegal in NYC, but is not enforced regularly), the fact that he was in a position to be recorded is unacceptable. The fact that he has also been given many chances to stay out of jail makes this particularly egregious. Was having a couple people give some likes on a video worth being possibly sent to jail for years? Of course not. But in the heat of the moment, that type of logic is suspended in the quest for adoration. And this is someone in the community that is rich and famous. Think about all the people not in Meek Mill position that do not get the chances that he gets. They're getting the book thrown at them immediately and with no mercy.

These two issues are issues that no one other than the people in the community observes and cares about even a little, therefore it can be nothing else but destructive. There are many strides being made to bring parity in the black community compared to other minorities, and when we waste our time on trivial things like gaining envy and adoration of others, there is less time being spent on uplifting everyone. I can make this style of post for a lot of other problems that plague the black community, but I feel as if these two issues are holding us back more than anyone else because they are the catalysts for most if not all of the issues we experience now.  If we spent the time flaunting what we have on actually trying to help each other out, we would be able to reach parity in terms of the privilege that other people enjoy in this county. Until then, we are only reinforcing the negative stereotypes that keep us taking 2 steps forward, and 4 steps back.

(Repost) Another Black Panther think piece?

I’ll be completely honest, I did not care for the buzz that came with The Black Panther movie prior to its’ release. It was cool watching him destroy Captain America and Bucky in Civil war, but that was about it. When the solo movie was announced I remember thinking, “This should be cool.” But for this post to make sense, you’ll need some background information about me.

I’m a guy who grew up playing a video game called ‘City of Heroes’ for hours. I loved reading comics (still do) and I loved reading up on comic book lore- man... I even wrote my own origin story for my college essay. Superheroes/villains have always been my thing.

Another thing: I’m not the type of person who looks for the ‘deeper meaning’ of things. I’m not a fan of the radically ‘woke’ culture of over-analyzing everything and trying to create nonexistent ties in story plots. Say what you want, but that’s just how I am. So maybe you can understand why the phrase “Black Panther is one of the most important movies of our lifetime” being thrown around had me rolling my eyes at first. Netflix’s Luke Cage got similar hype prior to its’ release, which I believe led to its’ unfortunate downfall. The hype set around this series caused fans to have high expectations… and they just weren’t met.

No, I wasn’t running to the theater to go see Black Panther; I just figured I’d get around to watching it within a couple weeks or so.

Like most blockbuster movies in the past five years, talks of record-breaking box office numbers started flooding all my social media feeds (Side note: does anyone know what any of that stuff means? Reminds me of ESPN with their random NBA stats). After about a week of reading reviews, one thing was certain: this movie may have lived up to the hype, but I still wasn’t convinced. There was one moment that took me from “I’ll watch it eventually” to “I have to watch it this movie ASAP” and that was when my parents came home from watching it a few nights ago. My parents hardly ever go to movies and if they do it’s probably to go see a Tyler Perry movie or something stereotypical like that. The fact that my parents planned a date night to go watch this movie and the fact that they saw a Marvel movie before I did, made me feel some type of way - I wouldn’t say it made me angry, but I was curious to hear what they took away from it. When my parents returned from the movie I asked my mom, “How was it?”. She looked over at me, did the Wakanda salute and said, “Amazing.” ... Dog... this may sound super cheesy and cliché, but at that exact moment I texted my girl and said, “We're going to see this movie this weekend.”

The Black Panther really may be a very important movie for the culture. Not only was it directed by a black man, (shout out to you, Ryan Coogler) the cast was primarily black, and it didn't use stereotypical portrayals of black people as in most films. It wasn’t about a black superhero fighting bad guys in the hood, or African American slaves or a portrayal of black women's anger at men. *Spoiler Alert* It was about a land owned by Africans who were mighty, wealthy, intelligent, and technologically advanced. The outside world wanted what they possessed. It was so refreshing to see us portrayed this way - the praiseworthy, the exquisite. The portrayals of women in this movie were so powerful and they weren’t powerful by means of someone or something else. Their character and moral integrities were ever-present throughout the film.

But the reason this movie really struck a nerve with me is because growing up as a fan of superheroes, it was common that these actors and illustrations never looked like me. As one would expect, they were always white.  Sure, I could relate to their morals and character, but I could never fully relate to them as people or their place in society because I couldn’t put myself in the shoes of a white guy – fictional or not.

I truly wish this movie came out when I was child because of how empowering it is. There was one scene that really resonated with me, at the end of the movie, after all the action and entertainment was over. After T'Challa takes his rightful place as the Black Panther and King of Wakanda, he flies back to Oakland, California and reveals his plan to open the Wakanda Outreach Center. A Wakandan ship lands right in the middle of a playground T'Challa and Shuri are standing in. A group of young minorities abandon their basketball game and run up to the ship to see what all the excitement is about. A young black kid, played by Alex Hibbert, walks up to T’Challa in amazement. This kid acted the hell out of that role because on that screen you could see how that moment changed that boys' life forever. It was as if you could tell how inspired this young kid was; the possibilities for him were endless. He could be more than he ever thought he could be.

Ninety percent of black children that watch this movie will be able to relate to this character. So, GO TAKE YOUR BLACK CHILDREN TO SEE THIS MOVIE. GO TAKE YOUR WHITE CHILDREN TO SEE THIS MOVIE. Go take your nieces, nephews, godchildren.... hell, take your neighbors kids.

EVERYONE GO SEE THIS MOVIE. TWICE.

(Repost) How brands save face for being jerks (AKA: The ticket/raffle system is still fucking you over, just in a different position)

My previous post about how brands use hype to skyrocket their brands at the expense of the consumer sparked a lot of conversations, and through those conversations I see that there is one thing that I purposely left out of the original post but was bought up to show how the brands do care, which is "addressing" the botters, as well as implementing ticket/raffle systems. Lets first address how they are directly fighting back against the bots.

Take our favorite brand Supreme for example. Supreme has addressed their bot problem in March 2017 by…. banning IP addresses and implementing CAPTCHA on their site (Supreme has banned IP addresses since at least 2015). You know, because public IP addresses can't be manipulated by proxies or CAPTCHA cannot be beaten by bots. Well Played Supreme, Well Played. The fact that they decided LAST YEAR they would add CAPTCHA to their site after years of excessive botting shows that they give ZERO fucks. Other brands have done essentially done the same thing, with similar results. And by results, I mean that it is not effective at all.

The Ticket/Raffle system is also a fun way that brands will try to limit the amount of overcrowding that happens on release day. Usually, there is an online or an in-person sign-up location where you will be able to get a ticket, which reserves you a spot on the line on release day. Supreme at one time instituted (and still do at times) a ticket system to ensure that people that want to come into the store to buy a specific drop on Thursdays got what they wanted. The Cynic in me thinks that this was done to deal not only with the large crowds but also overenthusiastic haters of the brand during a time when there was not as much security as there is at stores now on drop day. Regardless, this is still a terrible idea. For one, the same scalpers that would pay for people to stand in line for them now just pay for people to get a chance to get a ticket. Raffles for spots are even worse. Lets put this into perspective: you are fighting to get a spot in a raffle, to hope that your name is drawn. This is the gamifying of the whole process. If you think this is a legitimate response to the problem, you are delusional. This serves to make brands even more exclusive than they already were because now If you want a piece (Hypebeast talk for desired items), you have to be in the know enough to know where to go to reserve a ticket or beat bots in the Adidas confirmed app, for example. This is beyond ridiculous and gives more credence to my point that the brands do not care about selling as much as they possibly can. I'll say it again: if the brands cared about getting more people a highly sought after item, they would SIMPLY PRODUCE MORE OF THEM.

I'll conclude this follow up the same way I did my original post: The act of having to fight tooth and nail for a limited release item makes it all the more satisfying when you do luck up and get it. I understand that if they made more, the exclusiveness would disappear and It would be no different from a retro Jordan release. Jordan, however, does not have this problem to an extent since they have re-released the same 13 key sneakers over and over and over again for the past two decades. Your parents probably owned or have owned the OG version of the shoe you may want to get. Regardless, this does not make Jordan's less desirable to a newer generation of sneakerheads. Hypebeasts of this generation is akin to fine art collectors. Art collectors are part of an exclusive club of people that have 1 of 1 items that if resold would go for millions of dollars. Hypebeasts, unlike art collectors, are a sizable group of people who have the same thing as you, which makes the valuation of the item limited as there are still multiple copies (while having the same elitist attitude). I understand the value of limited edition items. They serve as a way to showcase the absolute best that a brand has to offer to the consumer. However, when every release of an item is marketed as such, it makes being a fan of a brand a particularly annoying experience. Supreme's biggest fear, in my opinion, is that they will become a homogenized brand like Stussy if their clothes were more accessible. So to avoid that, profits must be sacrificed in order to keep the Thursday vibes alive.