What's Gangsta?

I wrote a piece for The Tribune entitled 'Racist Cunts'. Don't worry, it was amended before Miranda Somebodyorother from Sidcup, Kent could choke on her yoghurt and raisin snack bar. The thrust of the piece was the parallel between the 'gun crime crisis' and the 'crisis' surrounding asylum and immigration in Britain, especially because the asylum issue is still thematically linked to a legacy of hostility towards immigration, anxieties regarding law and order and social stability. Debates on themes such as belonging and nationality, ethnicity and xenophobia specifically target immigrants and refugees reinforcing the idea that the new societal danger should be associated with a newly arrived section of the population.

Specifically the spurious connection, rubber-stamped by a compliant media, between immigration and crime have combined to construct young black British males as a threat to an ordered UK society. The ideological equating of 'gun culture' as an aspect of 'black culture' and the conjoining of immigration to rising crime rates in political discourse have set the conditions for a 'moral panic' to emerge. The reaction to the 'gun culture crisis' is excessively generalised, effectively criminalizing all young black males and conveniently compartmentalising the ownership of this societal problem to a single community.

All of which allows the Metropolitan Police to run the ad above and Rod Liddle - a man in desperate need of a hairdresser, a personal trainer and a jolly good reaming from a rusty chainsaw - to state that "the overwhelming majority of street crime, knife crime, gun crime, robbery and crimes of sexual violence in London is carried out by young men from the African-Caribbean community."

In Liverpool, over the past three years or so, there have been dozens of incidents of what could be described as ‘white on white’ crime. All of the gang members are white, working class youths. Teenagers are routinely shot and injured as the drug and gang wars have escalated and spilled onto the streets often claiming the lives of innocent bystanders. The race of the teenagers involved is never mentioned in the Liverpool shootings and these tragedies are always reported in the context of a dysfunctional society, whereas similar incidents involving black perpetrators in London always make reference to a fundamental deficiency in their culture. And rap music.

I've never understood why hip hop is so routinely lambasted. It's essentially a 'Bond' movie with beats and choruses in which the lead, gets the girl and the money. What's not to like? Rap was just 'pop music' to me until I discovered Public Enemy. I'm not sure now if they helped form my world view or whether they merely reinforced it. Whatever, they are the most important band on the face of the planet: forthright and insightful political opinion set to music which was, and remains, genuinely innovative. E-mails I've received from Chuck D saying he digs my band or that we could do something together are... Are... Well, let's face it, they're fucking awesome!

P.E. were so staggeringly inventive that they arguably gave birth to 'gangsta rap'. As the Bomb Squad they produced Ice Cube's debut album and helped develop him from a novelty act as one fifth of the N.W.A. freak show into a serious, politicised and challenging artist, legitimising him with his definitive 'Amerikkka's Most Wanted' opus. Major labels opened the floodgates for the imitators who followed eschewing Cube's critical social commentary, or 'Street Knowledge', in favour of mainstream acceptance through party anthems (Snoop Dogg, anyone?). If you ever want an irrefutable chronicle of Black American life pick up an Ice Cube disc.

I once went to one of his rare UK concerts in Bradford. The security was ridiculous: alsatians straining at the leash, tooled up private security officers, metal detectors, body searches, it all seemed a tad extreme for a gig, but the promoters were merely reacting to the hysteria whipped up by the tabloids. Inside the venue, in stark contrast, the atmosphere was one of easy bonhomie and excited anticipation: we were going to see a legend 'bring it'. And 'bring it' he did with his crip-walking hypeman Dub C. The highlight arrived about three quarters of the way through the concert when Mr Cube paused proceedings to introduce his baby son, carried by a babysitter, dummy still in his mouth.

"This is Lil Ice," announced the Cubed one, "And he's gonna be rocking all y'all's ass in a few years time." As one, the audience paused, melted and emitted a gentle 'Ahhhhh' and then gave a cheer which was the sonic equivalent of one hundred Jean Claude Jacquetti 5000 Hairdryers set to Level 5. It was a fantastic night.

The review of the gig in the inkies the following week described a sequence of events so different I had to check my ticket stub to make sure I was at the same show. First of all, the acclaimed music journalist alleged that there was a preponderance of guns inside the venue. Secondly, he claimed to have witnessed several stand-offs and that he was genuinely scared for his life. Finally, he claimed that the biggest cheer of the night was reserved for the song 'A Bitch Iz A Bitch'. All utter, u.t.t.e.r. bollocks, of course, and that particular song was never performed, but, hey, why let facts get in the way of reinforcing a stereotype?

Another reason to love Rap is the slang: it's always fun to throw a random 'izzle' into dinner party conversation and, whilst it may not be a word that I'd ever use myself (safe in the knowledge that my Mother would give me a damned good cuff around the ear), I've been reassured by the many references to 'hoes' this week in mainstream media as they examine John Terry's extra marital indiscretions. 'Bros before hoes' came the cry from The Guardian and other news outlets as they splashed their indignation across the front pages completely ignoring the story of the week: Cherie Blair clearing a fella who broke another man's jaw in a particularly violent example of what is being referred to as 'queue rage'. The reasons for the suspended sentence? 1. The chap who committed the assault was a religious man. 2. Er... 3. That's pretty much it really...

Mrs Blair, like her husband a devout Roman Catholic, meted out a two-year suspended sentence to the man rather than a six-month jail term. She told him:

"I am going to suspend this sentence for the period of two years based on the fact you are a religious person and have not been in trouble before. You caused a mild fracture to the jaw of a member of the public standing in a queue at Lloyds Bank. You are a religious man and you know this is not acceptable behaviour."

A 'mild' fracture? Well, that's all right then. Secular groups have been up in arms, but they miss the point entirely. This was merely Cherie's very public Valentine's gift to Tony. He's been under fire after his shameless performance at the Chilcot Inquiry and may even be called back to explain the glaring inconsistencies in his account of events. He needed reassurance that, right or wrong, a man guided by his God would be vindicated in the end and so in steps Cherie with perhaps the strangest judgement of all time (an official objection has been made to the Judicial Complaints Office which handles complaints against members of the judiciary). After all, it's only the mild destruction of an entire country AND he's got another one ongoing and a third pending. Somewhere in the wide, dark night, after an obscenely lucrative speaking engagement, Tony is banging Cherie doggy style whilst she spits filthy encouragement: "Ooooh! You're a religious man, Tony! You know this is unacceptable, don't you, you naughty boy?"

If I may quote Justice Louis Dembitz Brandeis:

"Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy."

Government creates the frame for society, not millionaire footballers, or rappers, or the newly arrived into a country. Anyone remember 'Tough on crime. Tough on the causes of crime'? Whilst the former may well have been observed, I would suggest the latter, represented by unemployment, social deprivation and educational underachievement has gone entirely unaddressed.

Shyne was a rapper signed to Bad Boy Entertainment who was earmarked to follow in Biggie's shoes. He was hanging out with J-Lo and P Diddy that fateful night when it all kicked off. He's in prison now for carrying a concealed weapon, but at the time of his arrest had a 'club banga' entitled 'That's Gangsta', in which he defined the term as follows:

"A hundred carats in the watch (THAT'S GANGSTA)

Gettin head in the parkin lot (THAT'S GANGSTA)
Menage red labels (THAT'S GANGSTA)
Honies with diamonds up in their navel (THAT'S GANGSTA)"

Poor, deluded fella. Being the Middle East Peace Envoy on behalf of the US, UN, EU and Russia when you've brought little but death and annihilation to the area, and at the same time pocketing £1,000,000 a year from a UAE investment fund currently negotiating a portion of the profits from the exploitation of Iraqi oil reserves? That's gangsta.

Biatch!