Posted on 04/19/2007 12:00:19 PM PDT by Dan Evans
Rap star Cam'ron says there's no situation -- including a serial killer living next door -- that would cause him to help police in any way, because to do so would hurt his music sales and violate his "code of ethics." Cam'ron, whose real name is Cameron Giles, talks to Anderson Cooper for a report on how the hip-hop culture's message to shun the police has undermined efforts to solve murders across the country. Cooper's report will be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, April 22 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.
"If I knew the serial killer was living next door to me?" Giles responds to a hypothetical question posed by Cooper. "I wouldn't call and tell anybody on him -- but I'd probably move," says Giles. "But I'm not going to call and be like, ÔThe serial killer's in 4E.' "
Giles' "code of ethics" also extends to crimes committed against him. After being shot and wounded by gunmen, Giles refused to cooperate with police. Why? "Because...it would definitely hurt my business, and the way I was raised, I just don't do that," says Giles. Pressed by Cooper, who says had he been the victim, he would want his attacker to be caught, Giles explains further: "But then again, you're not going to be on the stage tonight in the middle of, say, Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, with people with gold and platinum teeth and dreadlocks jumping up and down singing your songs, either," says Giles. "We're in two different lines of business."
"So for you, it's really about business?" Cooper asks.
"It's about business," Giles says, "but it's still also a code of ethics."
Rappers appear to be concerned about damaging what's known as their "street credibility," says Geoffrey Canada, an anti-violence advocate and educator from New York City's Harlem neighborhood. "It's one of those things that sells music and no one really quite understands why," says Canada. Their fans look up to artists if they come from the "meanest streets of the urban ghetto," he tells Cooper. For that reason, Canada says, they do not cooperate with the police.
Canada says in the poor New York City neighborhood he grew up in, only the criminals didn't talk to the police, but within today's hip-hop culture, that's changed. "It is now a cultural norm that is being preached in poor communities....It's like you can't be a black person if you have a set of values that say 'I will not watch a crime happen in my community without getting involved to stop it,'" Canada tells Cooper.
Young people from some of New York's toughest neighborhoods echo Canada's assessment, calling the message not to help police "the rules" and helping the police "a crime" in their neighborhoods. These "rules" are contributing to a much lower percentage of arrests in homicide cases -- a statistic known as the "clearance rate" -- in largely poor, minority neighborhoods throughout the country, according to Prof. David Kennedy of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "I work in communities where the clearance rate for homicides has gone into the single digits," says Kennedy. The national rate for homicide clearance is 60 percent. "In these neighborhoods, we are on the verge of -- or maybe we have already lost -- the rule of law," he tells Cooper.
Says Canada, "It's like we're saying to the criminals, "You can have our community....Do anything you want and we will either deal with it ourselves or we'll simply ignore it.' "
Oprah has Russel Simmons, Ben Chavis, and his gang on the other day.
They were attempting to explain that dialogue that Imus used was “ok” from rappers, because rappers are poor kids from the ‘hood and it just reflects society’s failure to educate them.
A fellow from the New York Times, (amazing - I know) asked that since most KKK members were dirt poor rural whites, should they be excused for their actions?
That was a really difficult question for them to deflect.
It’s amazing how strongly I support it as an adult against the myriad spoiled brats I see around me considering how opposed to it I was as a spoiled brat myself.
Chocolate City.
You said — “You don’t have a code of ethics you piece of dung!”
Well, I understand what you mean. And without a doubt, this is not the code of ethics that normal hard-working citizens of this country support.
Having said that — I do have to say that — yes — he (and “they”) — *do* have a “code of ethics”. That really must be understood. They definitely do have a code of ethics. It’s simply that their ethics are different than the average hard-working American.
Now, here’s the problem that we’re running into — in this society. We’re pretty much into a “post-modern” culture — which says that truth is whatever you decide it to be. Truth, in post-modernism, is only relevant that you, individually, as you construct it for yourself. The moral values are only relevant to you and not to anyone else.
Post-modernism says that while you can make up your own truth and your own values — you cannot insist on telling someone else their values — or even their “truth”.
So, if you wonder about the liberals, about the Democrats, about the rappers — about all these people — they are simply following the predominant “mindset” or “worldview” of our culture, today — which is post-modernism.
There really is only one antidote to post-modernism, and that is the recognition of our Creator God, whom the Bible says is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and who says that there are no other gods besides Him. From Him all things were created and nothing was created that exists that He did not create.
Thus, if we acknowledge (in our “worldview”) that there is *indeed* a Creator God, that he has *revealed Himself* explicitly by His written word (which He says He has) — then we do find we have *absolute truth* and we find we have *absolute morals* that exist outside of ourselves and our own existence. That absolute truth and those absolute morals — are *by definition* the very character and nature of our Creator God Himself (and He says He never changes).
Thus, it is only by recognition, in our society’s “worldview” of our Creator God, can we ever get back away from post-modernism, where everyone makes up their own truth and their own morals, because they are told they are a “god unto themselves” in this world.
So, yes, he does have a code of ethics — but it is not our Creator God’s code of ethics, and thus it is a false one.
Regards,
Star Traveler
The big time basketball player (Carmelo Anthony) is from baltimore and got in a bit of trouble for appearing in one of those “stop snitching” videos.
Never heard of him.
You said — “Paging Charles Darwin. Charles Darwin to the courtesy telephone please.”
Is it Darwin or post-modernism? Darwiin has been around for a very long time, and yet, we didn’t see this in our culture until more recently. However, post-modernism is more recent and this *more precisely* fits where this guy is coming from.
Regards,
Star Traveler
The sad thing is that it's like watching a friend who has joined a cult.
A white American who values the black community and wants it to survive can't help - because the more he "helps" by decrying criminality and encouraging law-abidingness the more he hurts the cause because he is an outsider criticizing the cult adherents: his arguments and concern are rejected as falsehearted manipulation by someone who doesn't have the cult member's best interests at heart.
Warn-A-Brother if you got the “strenth” of yo “effics.”
I doubt he's even capable of having a "loved one."
You said — “THAT’s THE FREAKIN’ PROBLEM, RIGHT THERE!......”
Well, analytically speaking — *not quite*. What you’re talking about there — “the way I was raised” is nothing more than “tradition”. And “tradition” is simply not the problem and not the answer. Many people think that tradition is the foundation to our society in the past, but it’s not.
Take a look at post #65...
Regards,
Star Traveler
In one of his novels, Robert Heinlein advanced that idea. He called them "abandoned areas", places where the police didn't go and only those with armored cars would venture.
Probably unconstitutional. I sometimes fantasize about a constitutional amendment that would allow the ejection of states from the union.
Letting people die and be murdered is a “code of ethics”
Hello?!?!?
This is hardly a post-modern movement.
It is the natural outgrowth of a culture where a sizable minority of male fathers and uncles have spent time in prisons.
The resulting prison mentality has been integrated into black culture at large.
My thoughts exactly. it should be illegal for the anti-snitchers to relocate.
You said — “Trendy T-Shirt often seen in urban courtroom galleries.”
You only “snitch” if you know that there is such a thing as “absolute truth” and that concept only comes from the acknowldegement that we have a “Creator God” — whose own character (which is unchanging) forms the very basis for that absolute truth and absolute morality. And if you have no acknowledgment of our Creator God, in our culture, then you cannot “snitch” — because you have no basis for determining or accusing someone else of violating morals. In post-modernism, morals only pertain to each individual as they, themselves, determine it to be. How can one “snitch” when they (the other person) has a “moral system” which is just as valid as yours (as in post-modernism, in which there exists no absolute truth)?
Regards,
Star Traveler
Thanks! I cannot remember which FReeper said it, but when I saw it I told him I was stealing it for tagline use.
LOL! That was amusing.
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