Metal Machine Music

[nomadthethird]

Yeah, sorry, I wasn't trying to put words in your mouth, I'm just trying to explain that when you say -- British people don't know anything about drugs, but round here we do it all the time, and it's not a big deal -- it sounds a bit like, "you're stupid and we're not", or even, "my country is harder than your country".

I never said British people didn't "know" about drugs, I said that apparently British people have a hard time believing that some entertainers were ACTUALLY drug dealers. There's a big difference, a huge one, between those two statements.

But if you want to, you can always insist on reading something into statements that isn't there, and then dragging down the caliber of discussion to try to score some sort of childish "irritation" ad hominem points, instead of actually reading what someone posts.

 

[scottdisco]

My point is that I think it's deeply offensive to say that it's "fake" to talk about drug dealing, that anyone who does is just making it up to sound "hard"--I have heard that countless times on here.

It's just a cultural difference. Look at the language used in the UK, they call thugs "rudeboys", as if their major flaw is simply transgressing some stupid uptight social code.

"rudeboy" is a Jamaican term actually.

Nobody in the U.S. calls people "rudeboys." Many people in the UK use it, I see it online all the damn time. The etymology of the term is irrelevant here.

my mentioning Padraig (U.S.) on rudeboys, Nomad, was just in connection with the above. i don't think the etymology is entirely irrelevant in the context of the thread, as however the phrase rudeboy came into being exactly, it wasn't just because they're being called on cutting the crusts off the cucumber sandwiches in the wrong way, and this was one post among many in a thread that had - at least for a time - settled into discussing crime, urban life, etc.

I think that hip-hop was instrumental in frightening white America into recognizing some of these issues, or at least letting them into the popular consciousness. Sometimes it's important to talk about the scary things.

agreed.
totally.

No, I'm not minimizing violence, I'd NEVER do that.

my bad.
i sincerely apologise.

i think i misread a post of yours and that was wrong.

I have a right to stand up for things that I believe are right or wrong.

please continue doing so.
please.

 

[vimothy]

What you said was --

British people act like drugs are this big bad evil thing

I say some people here, mostly British people, get TRES UNCOMFORTABLE when the subject comes up. It's very obvious.

I like the idea British people have that you can't actually be a crack dealer.

 

[nomadthethird]

What you said was --

British people act like drugs are this big bad evil thing

I say some people here, mostly British people, get TRES UNCOMFORTABLE when the subject comes up. It's very obvious.

I like the idea British people have that you can't actually be a crack dealer.

You've got these in the wrong order.

But,

Yes, I standby this.

Look at what happened when the availability of drugs in the U.S. was brought up!

Various different conniptions and misreadings. I never said anything about British people not knowing about drugs.

What is obvious is the British people, some of them, do not have a clear picture of how widely used, dealt, and available hard drugs are in the U.S. I will stand by this. This thread is a perfect performative example of these points.

 

[scottdisco]

actually, speaking of drugs

i would like to say to the slandering bounder Vimothy that it would be libel to state that if you give me brains i go white except

(a) British libel laws are notoriously loaded against the defendant and i do not wish to bankrupt the board's fiercest Zionist

er

(b) if you give me brains i do go white

i am Angus MacLise and i claim my glass of pomegranate juice

 

[nomadthethird]

If I came on here and started belittling or diminishing the social problems in the U.K., I would sure catch hell for it, and we all know it. I've already been yelled at for not thinking hoodie wearing is a cause for concern and racial or social profiling.

See how cultures are different? In the U.K., hoodies are the end of civilization. In the U.S., they're a very common article of clothing for the past 30 years.

 

[droid]

Baby Jesus is crying right now.

 

[nomadthethird]

I hope so. He's crying because someone converted to evolution.

Every minute, someone converts to evolution and the Baby Jeebus cries in heaven.

 

[scottdisco]

Free Jazz by Ornette Coleman?

yes please Oliver.

Free Jazz is much less noisy than, say, Peter Brötzmann's Machine Gun... both predate Metal Machine Music but both have discernible instruments in them, which may be a pretty big difference if you really want to do the "which came first?" game.

speaking of the great Brötzmann, i got quite into For Adolphe Sax thanks to the '02 CD re-issue.

"good times"

Every minute, someone converts to evolution and the Baby Jeebus cries in heaven.

why do you hate America?

i am Moe Tucker and i claim my pint of Felinfoel

 

[nomadthethird]

Huh?

 

[swears]

See how cultures are different? In the U.K., hoodies are the end of civilization. In the U.S., they're a very common article of clothing for the past 30 years.

They've been a very common article of clothing here as well, it's just that you've had instances of teenagers using the hoods to obscure their faces while commiting crimes, sometimes with a scarf over the bottom half of their face as well. That's where it comes from really.

 

[Sick Boy]

It was offensive in the extreme to hear what sounded to me like someone claiming that no one who is involved in the music industry actually lived in abject poverty in the middle of one of the worst neighborhoods in the U.S. I'm sorry, but I'm not going to pretend I haven't heard this same thing from a lot of British people, here and elsewhere. I have a right to stand up for things that I believe are right or wrong.

Please replace with "Notorious B.I.G."

 

[Sick Boy]

Also Nomad, I'm gonna have to challenge you on this "British mainstream press don't believe in drugs" shit. If you'd read any mainstream press in the UK, you'd see that if you so much as wear a hoodie in the UK, not only are you a drug dealer, but also a violent psychopath/rapist/dissident/heretic. Similarly if you're a celebrity and you get busted smoking hash, you are a heroin addict whose obituary is being written by most publications across the country in bloodthirsty anticipation. Please find this legendary article you've used to back up this entire, pointless and frankly hypocritical tirade.


It's funny you think British people don't believe in drug dealers, when in fact they believe that EVERYBODY is a drug dealer. Check that fucking article in the grime thread where that dude in the Sun is saying that too much exposure to grime music ACTUALLY makes you a "threat to society." Everyone is a criminal in Britain, even the people who aren't.

 

[nomadthethird]

Where the hell are you getting this?

I never said the mainstream British press "don't believe in drugs" full stop.

I said that the mainstream British press accuses hip-hop artists of being racists because they actually lived well and only make up FAKE personas as gun-toting drug dealers to ENTERTAIN WHITE PEOPLE.

The difference between these statements seems obvious.

The fact that the British press acts like everyone who wears a hoodie is some kind of hoodlum is a symptom of exactly the same problem that I'm describing.

 

[nomadthethird]

They've been a very common article of clothing here as well, it's just that you've had instances of teenagers using the hoods to obscure their faces while commiting crimes, sometimes with a scarf over the bottom half of their face as well. That's where it comes from really.

Yeah, that's never happened here either.

With bandanas and hoodies. Yes. We all remember the early 90s.

 

[nomadthethird]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2009/feb/13/notorious-big-barack-obama

There's one Sick Boy!

This article makes me fucking sick to my stomach, it's so disgusting what's being said here. It's so flagrantly, disgustingly hypocritical that it makes me question whether white people are really this fucking dense and stupid and why they have such strange double-standards. Westerns! Good. The Godfather! A classic! BIG? Bad bad evil bad!

These people obviously didn't live through the Newark riots, or the LA riots. They don't remember Rodney King, they don't know fucking jack shit about what life is like over here and it shows.

These are the same people who actually blame grime for the problems inherent in impoverished areas. It's bullshit! I hate that shit too, just as much. I think it's all part of the same ridiculous worldview that discounts the validity of how fucking evil inner-city poverty is, and the evils it breeds and encourages and that we turn a blind eye to until it's in our face NWA style.

I think we both know there have been countless versions of this same thing, but if you really want links I'll get some.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I said that the mainstream British press accuses hip-hop artists of being racists because they actually lived well and only make up FAKE personas as gun-toting drug dealers to ENTERTAIN WHITE PEOPLE.

1) again, please point to a single instance of this actually happening, rather than just making fatuous claims about the millions of times you've seen people doing it on "blogs" or whatever. *EDIT* note that claiming that rappers make up personas to ENTERTAIN WHITE PEOPLE and claiming that rappers rap about things that are made up are 2 different things.

2) what does the mainstream British press have to with Dissensus (aside from the contributions some posters may make to the Guardian etc.) and for that matter with British people at large?

 

[nomadthethird]

Just read through that ridiculous, stupid piece of trash.

It's got all of the racist cliches.

1) Black people don't listen to hip-hop, only suburban white people do to "get off" on the "fake" portrayals of inner-city lifestyles.

2) White people shouldn't perpetrate this "version of black masculinity" on the world. Because white people invented hip-hop, of course! It was an evil scheme, cooked up by 12 suits in a dark, smoke-filled room, not one of the most grassroots, participatory, political musics of the 20th century.

3) If only white people stopped recognizing the merit of work like Biggie's, all of the institutionalized racism and the socio-economic problems unique to the ghetto would melt away, and all black people would turn into Barack Obama overnight.

It literally makes me ill to read this.

 

[nomadthethird]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-389873/Malign-world-gangsta-rap.html

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/culturevulture/archives/2006/05/23/homey_schooled.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/jun/13/olympicgames2008.olympicgames2012

Here are a few to get you in the mood. I'm collecting them, and sorting through for the best. I've already found over 20.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

There are ignorant people in the U.K.? No way! Not my people. My people never have stupid, unfounded attitudes. My mainstream press never makes strange inflammatory, bigoted comments! There is never anything wrong with anything a British person might say or do. They could never possibly not know everything there is to know about the U.S.

This is what bothers me, very often, online and elsewhere. There are a lot of foreigners, not just British, but a lot of them, who think they know everything there is to know about American culture. It is very clear that they don't know everything about American culture, to anyone who actually lives in the U.S., but they don't seem to get this, no matter how many ways you try to explain it to them. This is offensive in the extreme, and I'm not going to pretend it isn't.

what are you talking about? who said that there are "no ignorant people" in the UK? who is arguing for the infallibility of the mainstream press? you're one who keeps tossing around the claims about "British people" as one monolithic whole.

also, who are these mythical "a lot of foreigners" who wrongly think they know everything about American culture? again, please, something that doesn't just broadly indict a vast, extremely tenuously defined group.

If I came on here and started belittling or diminishing the social problems in the U.K., I would sure catch hell for it, and we all know it. I've already been yelled at for not thinking hoodie wearing is a cause for concern and racial or social profiling.

who's yelling at you? we don't "all know" anything so please refrain from claiming such nonsense.