Falling into the Abyss. Analysis of Chapter 12 of Blues People

Separatist had had it. No longer would they risk their lives fighting for a country that wouldn't accept them. They deserved equal treatment, but remained separate. Their only solution was to embrace this separation and form their own culture, better than the whites, more advanced, and much cooler. Black culture turned away from their fellow lighter-skinned humans and formed a cultural identity that is still felt presently. Embracing the life they lead as underrepresented, unappreciated,  people without the commodities of a suburban lifestyle is still a common theme in successful rap music. One of the most decorated rap album of the 90s, Nas's Illmatic, raps about the struggles black people have growing up in the ghetto and his bleak everyday life. 50 years later blacks are still trying to remain separate. And us white people, us squares, we walked ourselves right into this mess.

After years of oppression, what group wouldn't give up and rebel? They formed an underground movement known as bebop, an artform created to be more intellectual, more complex than all the music that white America had stole from them. Black musicians weren't being rewarded for their accomplishments, they were having their accomplishments stolen from them, and white people took credit for their success. The answer to this was bebop, a technique so advanced that whites would not be able to replicate the sound. A code that was only understood by those who had dealt with the suffering that caused the music to be made. And bebop has taken on many different forms since then, no longer bebop, but just as prevalent. Black people are still cooler, the only difference now is that white people want to be a part of it. Me included, looking back on middle school with embarrassment as I left my high-class neighborhood to go to school dressed in baggy pants and my favorite Eminem sweatshirt. What a role model! I told my Mom she should call me "white-chocolate" and got excited for the next Ludacris and Nelly albums. Generally, this confused people not associated with the culture of my middle-school (where all, or at least most, of the white kids wanted to be "gangsta") they wondered where I connected with black culture, but wasn't it just a middle school kid trying to be cool? This may be true, but it is not understood, "wankstas," as they are called, are the mockery of jokes and movies (Mailbu's Most Wanted).

50 Cent's song represents general attitudes toward white people trying to assimilate into black culture, most importantly rapping. "You ain't a friend of mine, (yeah)/ You ain't no kin of mine, (nah)." 50 Cent outlines the hostility towards the wanksta movement, white people aren't kin, at one point they rejected his race, so now he will do the same to them. Rap has been formed into an exclusive genre mainly for blacks and the one successful white rapper, Eminem, is who is seen the most if one was to google image "wanksta." This left my former self a very sad, chubby white kid with an Eminem shirt and way too many pairs of pants from Anchor Blue.

"Are you ready?" White people mocked blacks, taunting that their uncivilized ways weren't ready to enter white America. Well, our rejection has come back to bite us, black people still no longer are fully assimilated into white America. And not only are they not ready, they don't want to anymore. The effects of bebop and the powerful movement it created is still being felt in modern society as white kids feel trapped and a need to rebel, using rap as the medium to do so. Only they can't embrace this culture without being mocked. Just as at one point a black person would be mocked for trying to enter the "prestigious" white community. I've since given away the cd collection I accumulated in middle school, bye, Dutty Rock, Word of Mouf, Jackpot, Get Rich or Die Tryin'. My complexion is much more confortable with the Radiohead coming out of my speakers.