Currrtiss

There is an interview that Curtis Jackson AKA: 50 cent gave to Spin magazine. I want to dissect two portions of that interview. The first point is this one:

He gets up and asks me to follow him out of the recording studio and down the hallway. We enter a room where members of the G-Unit entourage are congregated. HBO is blaring from a wide-screen TV. A scowling Tony Yayo sits at a table to the right, his back against the wall, as he methodically constructs an enormous blunt. 50 Cent addresses the group.

Yo, let me ask you a question. People who have been incarcerated, for whatever reason, around us in the hood, how often do they watch movies like Menace to Society, Goodfellas, Casino, Scarface?

The entourage immediately barks answers: "All of them, all the time." "Repeatedly, repeatedly." "People watch Scarface 100 times a year, B." "Over and over and over."


Let me tell you this. He and his crew are NOT lying. I had a roommate at Tuskegee. Yes, folk, College man, who was ob-sessed with goodfellas. In fact he and his boys, from the stories I had been told, were doing their best to live a "legal" goodfellas life. It is not said enough times how influential Goodfellas, Godfather and it's ilk are on black youth. And believe it when 50 says it: Just about every one of these young men think that they will be the exception to the "jail or dead" rule. I will agree with 50 cent 100% that if we are going to discuss banning Hip Hop or certain types of Hip Hop, then Goodfellas,the Godfather series and all that need to be banned as well. If "we" are not going to do that then all the talk of "reforming" Hip Hop is simply blaming black folk for a problem we didn't make.

The next point is this:

You got people who are inspired by the music. They see it and they see where it comes from. You see this [holds up a platinum, bling-encrusted cross]? I don't wear this all the time. But when I go out in the street, I put it on. You know why? Because these kids, I'll blow their high if they see me without it. And they sure don't wanna fuckin' be you if you don't have the stuff that excited them about you in the first place.

So should kids look up to you?
If they're inspired by me. People who come from where I come from, I give them hope. I make them believe that what they want to achieve is actually possible. If they see me going from a space where I didn't have anything to a space where I have everything, they're inspired. But you can't tell people they should do what you've done, because everybody's made big mistakes. It's like, publicly, all the things I say are good, if you watch what I do. What I say on record is entertainment; but what I'm actually doing with my life and the things I've had the opportunity to do is what makes me inspiring.

I've had this "Ghetto Fab" discussion with many people. This ghetto fab thing is costing middle class and poor black people a whole lot and needs to be nullified by any means necessary. It is unfortunate that indiscriminate display of material wealth is what is required to motivate them. The very first problem with this is that as anyone with even a slightly critical eye will note, not everyone can be a multi-platinum selling MC. In fact You can probably count all current Top billing MC's on your hands. So with 30 million black folk in the US, the odds are severely stacked against anyone who wishes to enter the industry. Secondly there are many many millionaires out there who are not rockin' a blinged out cross. In fact most of us pass them everyday and have no clue. That's why black folk have so little wealth to pass on. We are, as a group, way way way to stuck on "demonstrating" wealth then actually gaining wealth. 50 cent is in a position where he can take the attention these young bucks are giving him and school them on real wealth building and maintenance.