James Howard Kunstler on Rap

[Steve M.]

James Howard Kunstler is a cultural and urban planning critic who criticizes America's suburban living pattern for destroying cities, turning the countryside into a nightmarish landscape of shopping malls and fast-food joints, and making us rely on cars to go anywhere and do anything. He argues that disinvestment in the cities has produced a pathological ghetto culture - which led to rap. Here's what he has to say:

For the past two decades, lower-class blacks especially have been encouraged only to become more separate, more different in behavior, more divorced from the mainstream norms of speech, manners, and costume. This dislocation is reflected ominously in pop music. Hip-hop has to be taken seriously because it is so pervasive, and it presents a range of compelling cultural meanings. The most threatening, of course, is its association with crinminal behavior - the rhetoric of gangsterism, the glorification of gunplay and murder, and the grandiose imagery of unearned riches. Street mythology has it that hip-hop clothes, accessories, and lingoare extensions of jailhouse fashion. Less obvious is how much these childish conventions of manner - exaggerated clumsy body language, pants many times too large, hats worn sideways - infantlize their followers. Children do not engage in politics, and so one of the worst aspects of this sector of pop culture has been the depoliticization of black politics, especially young adults. Another result of this surrender of politics to entertainment has been an amazing dearth of black political leadership at a time when it couldn't be more desperately needed to resolve the unfinished business of the social surface project. . . .

At their worst, the rap videos played on cable TV resemble the war chants of a conflict that has not yet been joined. Only among a group as narcissistically lost and clueless as white suburban America would these messages be welcomed as just another species of entertainment.

In short, rap is a very bad thing.

Kunstler argues that when we run out of enough oil to keep America going and we have a depression far worse than the one we had in the 1930's, the ghettos will explode again in even greater rage than before, and white people who have defended rap and its practitioners before won't be defending them again. They'll be too busy trying to survive the times.

[ABlairican Pie]

Yo, yo, yo, you no be talkin' trash about no rap, cuz, rap be da most illest muzik in da hood, yaknowwhati'msayin'? I'll kick any1's mofo ass who be talkin'
smack about rap, cuz it be talkin' bout universal theemz of da human experience and da plight of da sad state of human affairs in da post-modern wurld, like da po-po's, they be hasslin us bro's N homiez wile we be robbin N pimpin, like dey tink dey is da Bomb, whites is da Man, and dey be da worst NME dat bro's got. Like dere some bros who tink dey all dat, but I get out my Glock and show dem dat dey be respectin me and no be dissin me, yaknowwhati'msayin'? Or POW POW POW, dey get it upside da head! MFerz.

But wtf dat mean, "post-modern"?? How can s be post-modern, iz dat be like, "after modern"?? Like we be livin in da Modern Timez, how can stuff be post-modern, like izzat be like Da Jetsons in da Space Age push button world wit da bitchin' bubble-dometop carz N S? True dat. I think rap be post-modern like dat, cuz y'all just push button and y'all's gotz da illest beats, none o' dat guitars N drums, dat be WHITE boyz s, like I be learnin' how 2 play MFin' music?! U be illin', what yo MFin ass be trippin' on, N kin I git some o dat you got? But like I'z be sayin, rap is da Bomb, we do like whutz homiez do best, STEALIN, like we be rippin' off otherz' tunes and not payin' nuttin fer royaltiez. Ya lose, MFer!

But WTF some professah be sayin' rap cause serious s, some MF like dat tryin' ta give us smartification, we be doin whut be required of da streets some time soon, a bro got to fight to live! Ya gotz ta do it NE way ya can, youknowwhati'msayin?

[Steve M.]

Uh, you're being sarcastic, right?

[ABlairican Pie]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

Uh, you're being sarcastic, right?

OF COURSE!!!

[Steve M.]

Oh, alright. Carry on!

[Steve M.]

Anyway, I think it's obvious that hip-hop is a threat not just to popular music but to civilization per se because of all the socioeconomic iompliactions and inferences involved. We need to reinstate music appreciation programs in urban schools - STAT!

[ABlairican Pie]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

Anyway, I think it's obvious that hip-hop is a threat not just to popular music but to civilization per se because of all the socioeconomic iompliactions and inferences involved. We need to reinstate music appreciation programs in urban schools - STAT!

That's the problem with rap, its appeal lies in the fact that it's NOT music, and that it conveys this image of the "musician" as a cool thug. If parents, preachers, and politicos don't like it, it adds "legitimacy"--"It MUST be good if they hate it!!"

Sad that real music, real rock and roll is taking a back seat to the overblown popularity of rap.

[Steve M.]

Originally Posted by Captain ABlairica

Sad that real music, real rock and roll is taking a back seat to the overblown popularity of rap.

I concur!

[Dr. Thong]

Fer shizzle.

[Dr. Thong]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

James Howard Kunstler is a cultural and urban planning critic who criticizes America's suburban living pattern for destroying cities, turning the countryside into a nightmarish landscape of shopping malls and fast-food joints, and making us rely on cars to go anywhere and do anything. He argues that disinvestment in the cities has produced a pathological ghetto culture - which led to rap. Here's what he has to say:

For the past two decades, lower-class blacks especially have been encouraged only to become more separate, more different in behavior, more divorced from the mainstream norms of speech, manners, and costume. This dislocation is reflected ominously in pop music. Hip-hop has to be taken seriously because it is so pervasive, and it presents a range of compelling cultural meanings. The most threatening, of course, is its association with crinminal behavior - the rhetoric of gangsterism, the glorification of gunplay and murder, and the grandiose imagery of unearned riches. Street mythology has it that hip-hop clothes, accessories, and lingoare extensions of jailhouse fashion. Less obvious is how much these childish conventions of manner - exaggerated clumsy body language, pants many times too large, hats worn sideways - infantlize their followers. Children do not engage in politics, and so one of the worst aspects of this sector of pop culture has been the depoliticization of black politics, especially young adults. Another result of this surrender of politics to entertainment has been an amazing dearth of black political leadership at a time when it couldn't be more desperately needed to resolve the unfinished business of the social surface project. . . .

At their worst, the rap videos played on cable TV resemble the war chants of a conflict that has not yet been joined. Only among a group as narcissistically lost and clueless as white suburban America would these messages be welcomed as just another species of entertainment.

In short, rap is a very bad thing.

Kunstler argues that when we run out of enough oil to keep America going and we have a depression far worse than the one we had in the 1930's, the ghettos will explode again in even greater rage than before, and white people who have defended rap and its practitioners before won't be defending them again. They'll be too busy trying to survive the times.

Could you provide a link to this article? I'd like to post it on a music forum that I frequent? Thanks.

[Dr. Thong]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

James Howard Kunstler is a cultural and urban planning critic who criticizes America's suburban living pattern for destroying cities, turning the countryside into a nightmarish landscape of shopping malls and fast-food joints, and making us rely on cars to go anywhere and do anything. He argues that disinvestment in the cities has produced a pathological ghetto culture - which led to rap. Here's what he has to say:

For the past two decades, lower-class blacks especially have been encouraged only to become more separate, more different in behavior, more divorced from the mainstream norms of speech, manners, and costume. This dislocation is reflected ominously in pop music. Hip-hop has to be taken seriously because it is so pervasive, and it presents a range of compelling cultural meanings. The most threatening, of course, is its association with crinminal behavior - the rhetoric of gangsterism, the glorification of gunplay and murder, and the grandiose imagery of unearned riches. Street mythology has it that hip-hop clothes, accessories, and lingoare extensions of jailhouse fashion. Less obvious is how much these childish conventions of manner - exaggerated clumsy body language, pants many times too large, hats worn sideways - infantlize their followers. Children do not engage in politics, and so one of the worst aspects of this sector of pop culture has been the depoliticization of black politics, especially young adults. Another result of this surrender of politics to entertainment has been an amazing dearth of black political leadership at a time when it couldn't be more desperately needed to resolve the unfinished business of the social surface project. . . .

At their worst, the rap videos played on cable TV resemble the war chants of a conflict that has not yet been joined. Only among a group as narcissistically lost and clueless as white suburban America would these messages be welcomed as just another species of entertainment.

In short, rap is a very bad thing.

Kunstler argues that when we run out of enough oil to keep America going and we have a depression far worse than the one we had in the 1930's, the ghettos will explode again in even greater rage than before, and white people who have defended rap and its practitioners before won't be defending them again. They'll be too busy trying to survive the times.

Could you provide a link to this article? I'd like to post it on a music forum that I frequent. Thanks.

[vashti1999]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

James Howard Kunstler is a cultural and urban planning critic who criticizes America's suburban living pattern for destroying cities, turning the countryside into a nightmarish landscape of shopping malls and fast-food joints, and making us rely on cars to go anywhere and do anything. He argues that disinvestment in the cities has produced a pathological ghetto culture - which led to rap. Here's what he has to say:

For the past two decades, lower-class blacks especially have been encouraged only to become more separate, more different in behavior, more divorced from the mainstream norms of speech, manners, and costume. This dislocation is reflected ominously in pop music. Hip-hop has to be taken seriously because it is so pervasive, and it presents a range of compelling cultural meanings. The most threatening, of course, is its association with crinminal behavior - the rhetoric of gangsterism, the glorification of gunplay and murder, and the grandiose imagery of unearned riches. Street mythology has it that hip-hop clothes, accessories, and lingoare extensions of jailhouse fashion. Less obvious is how much these childish conventions of manner - exaggerated clumsy body language, pants many times too large, hats worn sideways - infantlize their followers. Children do not engage in politics, and so one of the worst aspects of this sector of pop culture has been the depoliticization of black politics, especially young adults. Another result of this surrender of politics to entertainment has been an amazing dearth of black political leadership at a time when it couldn't be more desperately needed to resolve the unfinished business of the social surface project. . . .

At their worst, the rap videos played on cable TV resemble the war chants of a conflict that has not yet been joined. Only among a group as narcissistically lost and clueless as white suburban America would these messages be welcomed as just another species of entertainment.

In short, rap is a very bad thing.

Kunstler argues that when we run out of enough oil to keep America going and we have a depression far worse than the one we had in the 1930's, the ghettos will explode again in even greater rage than before, and white people who have defended rap and its practitioners before won't be defending them again. They'll be too busy trying to survive the times.

In short, rock is really a bad thing. There's no musicality to what so-called rock "musicians" do, it's all just noise. It's a culture filled with depressed, self-destructive slobs who either commit suicide, drink and overdose themselves to death or breed such fandom that their followers are willing to run up on stage and murder band members themselves. The music is so empty they know they can't perform with pyrotechnics, so they'll use fireworks on stage even in a small club, putting people's lives in jeopardy. That's all I see when I see rock. Rock is seriously a bad, bad thing and needs to be stopped, NOW!

Now does that sound like an absurd statement to you? Just as rock is not all about those things I mentioned, neither is rap/hip hop all about the negative things that you people who hate it seem to latch on to. The music is not based on incidents, it's not based on its influence either. Don't believe that the minds of the rap's young Black audience are so under-developed that they (we) can't separate any images in the videos or imagery in the music that they (we) see and hear from real life.

My nephew, the biggest rap fan in my family, has a good job, speaks proper English, has never committed a crime and doesn't walk around with his underwear showing above his pants. Yes, it exists, but the picture this article paints that that's all there is and that the majority of youth who listen to the music aren't bright enough to figure it out is really the "bad thing" here. Give them more credit than that.

Unfortunately they don't sell like 50 Cent, but Common, Mos Def, Dead Prez, The Roots and Talib Kweli are all making political hip hop. Then again, hip hop's detractors don't think about those types of artists when they're putting it all down. Just keep allowing the negative aspects (minority, not a majority) to be representative of the entire culture and being so powerful that "real rock" has been forced to the back seat. Wow.

Tell Kunstler to pick out some lottery numbers for me. If he helps me become rich, only then will I pay attention to his predictions for our future.

[Steve M.]

Originally Posted by vashti1999

In short, rock is really a bad thing. There's no musicality to what so-called rock "musicians" do, it's all just noise. It's a culture filled with depressed, self-destructive slobs who either commit suicide, drink and overdose themselves to death or breed such fandom that their followers are willing to run up on stage and murder band members themselves. The music is so empty they know they can't perform with pyrotechnics, so they'll use fireworks on stage even in a small club, putting people's lives in jeopardy. That's all I see when I see rock. Rock is seriously a bad, bad thing and needs to be stopped, NOW!

Now does that sound like an absurd statement to you? Just as rock is not all about those things I mentioned, neither is rap/hip hop all about the negative things that you people who hate it seem to latch on to. The music is not based on incidents, it's not based on its influence either. Don't believe that the minds of the rap's young Black audience are so under-developed that they (we) can't separate any images in the videos or imagery in the music that they (we) see and hear from real life.

My nephew, the biggest rap fan in my family, has a good job, speaks proper English, has never committed a crime and doesn't walk around with his underwear showing above his pants. Yes, it exists, but the picture this article paints that that's all there is and that the majority of youth who listen to the music aren't bright enough to figure it out is really the "bad thing" here. Give them more credit than that.

Unfortunately they don't sell like 50 Cent, but Common, Mos Def, Dead Prez, The Roots and Talib Kweli are all making political hip hop. Then again, hip hop's detractors don't think about those types of artists when they're putting it all down. Just keep allowing the negative aspects (minority, not a majority) to be representative of the entire culture and being so powerful that "real rock" has been forced to the back seat. Wow.

Tell Kunstler to pick out some lottery numbers for me. If he helps me become rich, only then will I pay attention to his predictions for our future.

And who's on your avatar? Sorry, I can't take you seriously.

[Steve M.]

Originally Posted by Dr. Thong

Could you provide a link to this article? I'd like to post it on a music forum that I frequent. Thanks.

I actually copied it from James Kunstler's latest book, The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century. In it, Kunstler explains how the world is reaching peak oil production, and how the United States is especially unpreprared for it. There's more from him at www.kunstler.com . Check out his essay "Las Vegas - Utopia of Clowns."

[vashti1999]

Originally Posted by Steve M.

And who's on your avatar? Sorry, I can't take you seriously.

That's Madonna on my avatar, and...? What's your point? Do I need to change my avatar for you to not make a lame crack or do you not care to discuss any points I brought up?