Posted by Min. Paul Scott on 2/22/2002, 4:02 pm Min. Paul Scott It is the call that every family member dreads, a As I hung up the phone, my mind begin to race in a The black community has long had a love/hate In the late 1980s the rap group NWA bragged about To say that the priorities of some in the rap So where spending one day in jail was one too many for Hip Hop has accommodated the brothas on lock down by But for every brotha that comes out of prison to
Gangsta Rappin on the Chain Gang
collect call from a correctional facility. What up,
cuz, said the voice on the other end. It was my young
cousin who is serving time for something or nother.
After exchanging greetings, he went into a monologue
about how he was staying strong and holdin it down.
His voice carried a slight hint of a tremble. I guess
that he could not cry in front of his homies; I cried
for him. As I over heard the guard in the background
yelling that his time was up, I tried to find a deep
spiritual word of wisdom that if it could not free him
from his physical prison could at least release him
from his mental. But all I could muster was a weak
keep ya head up.
thousand directions trying to figure out what went
wrong. It is a worn out cliché used by every mother
or
father who has a son in jail but in this case it is
true, he wasnt a bad kid. Unfortunately, the
obvious follow up question of what is he doing in
jail, then always goes unanswered as this is one of
those intangibles that becomes the eternal rhetorical
question.
relationship with the system as justice or injustice
was usually determined by which police officer you
encountered and what mood he was in that night. You
rolled the dice and took your chances between a squad
of Office Friendlys or a lynch mob that would act
as judge, jury and executioner.
From the Bull Connors of the 50s who set fire hoses
and attack dogs on innocent children to the present
day cops who shoot innocent black men 41 times, the
police are the public servants we love to hate. For
Black folks in the early 20th century gettin in
trouble with the law could have been for something as
major as cutting somebody, Saturday night at the juke
joint or as minor as staring at a white woman too
long. The major offense, however, was challenging the
white supremacist system. All Civil Rights workers
could expect to be in jail one time or another as this
was the right of passage for being in the movement.
The problem facing us in the 21st century is that the
young brotha that goes to jail for selling crack or
killing a little girl in a drive by shooting feels
that
he is just as much a political prisoner as Geronimo Ji
Jaga (Pratt). To hear them tell it they are just
doing their part rebelling against a white racist
system that is holdin the Black man down. The
discussion of true freedom fighters in the Afrikan
community has not been encouraged by the media and
definitely not discussed in the public school system.
So to the less enlightened, the insanity of aiding and
abetting the genocide of Afrikan people seems
perfectly sane. In that context the lackadaisical
attitude that some brothas have when faced with the
prospect of spending 8 to 10 years of their prime
locked in a cell begins to become some what rational.
Not to mention the role that pop culture has played in
shaping the minds of young black men.
being the worlds most dangerous group because of the
flack that they received over their famous anti-police
anthem that many of us (even saved folks) still
mumble under our breath after being pulled over for
doing 90 in a 55 mile an hour zone. Ironically,
members of NWA went on to become multi million
dollar movie stars and record producers, while many
political prisoners remain in jail or exile; their
only crime being they loved Black people more than
they loved themselves.
community are mixed up is an under statement. When
some rappers are sent to jail, you would think that
they were imprisoned for painting the white house
black not for hitting someone upside the head with a
champagne bottle. We live in the era where the shouts
of Free Mumia have been drowned out by the screams
of
Free Puffy. Contrary to the media hype, these
rappers are not reading from Eldridge Cleavers Soul
on Ice as the desire to obtain more ice for their
medallions takes precedence over some revolution.
most black folks, young brothers today brag that they
can do a five year bid standing on one foot. But the
world goes on while brothas are locked up and
everything changes except in the fantasy world of hip
hop.
making time stand still and not evolving to the
higher levels that it was created to reach. I guess
they do not want the brothas who spend 20 years in
prison to come out of the gate like Fly Guy from
Im Gonna Get You Sucka sportin that big brimmed
hat and those platform shoes with the fish tanks ,
pimpin to the theme from Shaft. In 2002, Hip Hop
remains locked in its own dimension that defies time
and space where 35 year old rappers remain forever
young and FUBU shirts never wear out. The Hip Hop
Fairy tale usually ends with a brotha coming out of
prison and becoming rich by rappin about how he
held it down upstate.
record a platinum CD, there are a thousand other
brothers, like my cousin, who will come out broken;
forever haunted by the ghost of what they might have
been.
Minister Paul Scott is founder of the New Righteous
Movement based in Durham, NC which teaches Afrikan
Liberation Theology. He can be reached at
operationmedia@yahoo.com
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