Tuesday, June 17, 2008
So White, You Need Special Sunglasses To Look At Them
Professional white person Mary Battiata has written an article for the Huffington Post on how the election of Barack Obama could possibly kill the "bling" and "gangsta" styles amongst black youth. Slate columnist and noted racial theorist Mickey Kaus chimes in, hoping that Obama's cultural revolution also puts the boot to the neck of hip-hop and stomps hard.
Now, see, there's one flaw in this idea: black people are, well, people. They are not a hive mind. The style and subculture that Battiata and Kaus look at like a rotting carcass on a desert highway is most popular amongst inner city people who have come from poverty. To say the election of a black multimillionaire will launch off a cultural shift that will completely demolish the way of life clung to by working class black people is like saying the election of a rich white person would destroy the hippies, or the punks, or the skinheads.
Actually, scratch that. Reading over Mickey Kaus's post, that's exactly what I'd expect him to think. Yup, let's wipe out hip-hop! Out with Public Enemy! Down with Mos Def! Goodbye to political, activist rap that shares the same genre as songs about bitches and bling! Drop the bomb! Exterminate the brutes!
Douchebag.
