Critique 3: Chapter 3

                Chapter 3 was possibly the most interesting chapter of The Hip-hop Wars I’ve read. Two particular topics that interested me were the sentiments surrounding the no snitching attitude and the anti-educational attitude. Both issues I believe I was partially aware of before reading the chapter however Rose goes into their origins and reasons and by doing so she forces you to realize that rap is not hurting black culture so much as the people themselves are. Rap merely reflects an attitude of, as Geoffery Canada put it, “Just have our community. Do anything you want, and we will either deal with it ourselves or we will simply ignore it.” This attitude towards crime perpetuates the attitude that crime is ok. You can say it is up to the parents and leaders of the community to prevent the music from doing this however the issue lies in the anti educational attitude. Anything about mainstream culture is enemy to many children who also embrace the anti snitching ideals. Because of this any guidance from school or parents is found to not be helpful to these kids but rather makes them feel even more attacked. This is important as combined with the no snitching attitude these two common youth ideals create a recipe for neighborhoods full of drop outs and eventually as a result of lack of education and employment you get gangs. I found it interesting that Rose was able to root all these societal woes that are blamed on rap music to a larger cultural view that is flawed. It is a view that must be changed if improvement is ever to be an option.