Tag Archives: behavior

Where the beef should lie

September 11, 2008 d dot b Leave a comment

Where the Beef Should Lie

Rappers, misdirection, media

Rappers constantly beef with each other, of all the other musical genres, hip-hop music has to have the most animosity amongst its artists. Rappers have gained a career (a la 50 cent) by dissing and feuding with other rappers and their respective camps, and of course, some rappers have also perished of beef (R.I.P. Tupac & Biggie). The causes and reasons for beefing are self-serving at best; it can be looked at an attempt for one rapper to gain notoriety for dissing another or it can stem from a real personal beef that began before the music. Lately, it has been the former, as many rappers will diss others so that they can get heavy rotation in the rumor mill and spill cycle – this usually happens just around the time when they are releasing an album. At times though, the reason for beefing can seem silly at best, some of these beefs include:

– DFB beefing with D4L over who created the ‘Lean with it rock with it’ dance
* note: both groups are irrelevant

– Ice-T dissing Soulja Boy because he thinks he is corny

– 50 Cent dissing Ja Rule for singing on the tracks, but then 50 Cent makes a career of singing on tracks (’21 Questions’, ‘candy shop’, ‘ayo technology’)

– The rise of local/up and coming rappers jacking somewhat-established rappers (like Yung Berg), taking their jewellery, and showing such jewellery on YouTube
* note: YouTube jackings of rappers is a growing and alarming trend, rappers need to get their insurance game up!

Not one to condone beefing or dissing, but I think that rappers need to step up their game and take their dissing/beef to the next plateau; I mean verbally attacking a fellow rapper, saying that you are going to kill him, rob him, et cetera, is not that realistic – rappers should really be beefing with people that are detrimenting their community and society. Hip-Hop, in its childhood was heralded as a genre to address social issues and injustices, the classic song ‘The Message’, had a real message of how politics, media, and the government had left many inner city New York communities in perils.

Somewhere, along hip-hop’s progression, the pursuit of using music for ‘social messages’ subsided for the pursuit of material wealth. Well, if a rapper is going to ‘clap’ at anyone, it should not be his fellow brethren, it should maybe be somebody like:

Bill O’Reilly
The popular Fox News pundit has a successful show called the O’Reilly Factor, where the tagline is ‘No Spin Zone’, this guy has been described as a neo, fascist, racist, biased reporter – everything from calling Michelle Obama Barrack’s “Baby Mama”, to actually challenging rappers; O’Reilly made Ludacris lose a sponsorship deal with PepsiCo over O’Reilly’s rant of Ludacris and his questionable misogynistic lyrics.

Lou Dobbs
If I see another report on illegal immigrants from this guy, I will go crazy. Dobbs complains how jobs are being taken from Americans by migrant workers, but what he fails to realize most times that the jobs that are being ‘taken’ are the ones that average Americans will not do.

GWB
I think Kanye said it best in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, but I have to give rappers credit – they have took jabs and shots at GWB, while more underground rappers have dedicated whole songs to his legacy.

Besides this list, I am sure that rappers can find other sources for beef than another rapper that may or may not have stole their dance, swag, or jewellery.

.:: d.b ::.

Technology, Work

Workplace Etiquette for the Yuppy

August 26, 2008 d dot b Leave a comment

Workplace Etiquette for the Yuppy
Some tips for getting through the day

The Yuppy (Young Urban Professional) is constantly on the go; most times though, the Yuppy needs to resort to a full-time job in order to fund their projects. However, the Yuppy has to be careful and walk that fine line of being productive at work, and being productive for their business. Thus, I thought I would share a few tips with my fellow Yuppielites.

Cycler
alt+tab (windows) OR apple+tab (mac)

You have more important things to do than prepare the 3rd-quarter report, you need to check your gmail and facebook. Instead of making it look bait by using your mouse to click back to the work your supposed to do, using alt+tab on the keyboard quickly changes your active window in a smooth manner.

IT Connect

Your IT Department is one of your greatest resources at work, befriend one of them as they can give you valuable Intel and help. The IT department can grant you special privileges, advise you what sites not to visit, and give you a heads-up on ‘crackdowns’.

Avoiding the IDC Symptom

The IDC symptom can be defined as “I Don’t Care”, and is developed when your co-workers start talking to you about trite details: ‘My kids hockey games’, ‘this boss is incompetent because …’, ‘did you watch that show last night’, and so on. My initial, instinctual response is ‘I really don’t care’, and ‘why are you talking to me’, but since we need this job to generate income and living, we need to avoid the IDC’s. Some common ways to avoid the IDC is:- Smile and nod: very effective, but can be deadly because it implies that you are actually intrigued in the conversation, and it shows that you are engaged.- Hmm, ok, wow: also very effective, alludes to you being not only responsive, but implies that you are listening to their every note and syllable

Outlook
Outlook is the enterprise e-mail application that most businesses use because of its powerful Exchange Server (even though Mozilla Thunderbird is better). I know you may have some documents to work on, and opening up MS Word may seem very suspicious as you may have to do a lot of ‘cycling’, however, Outlook can be used as a word processor and has some useful features such as ‘tasks’ and ‘notes’. Better yet, if you are working on a document, compose it in an e-mail, so that even if someone walks by, it looks like you are composing a work-related email.

Punctuality
This really shouldn’t be a point, but its important that you start on time, and leave on time. Because as with all work environments, there are snitches and informers – don’t give them anything to use against you.

With that said, you are the future of tomorrow, get ahead today … at work.

.:: d.b ::.

Entertainment

Importance of Media Training, ex. 2 "Effiminizing"

June 11, 2008 d dot b Leave a comment

Importance of Media Training, ex 2 “Effiminizing“

Bobby Brown recalling an encounter with Usher:

“When I walked into the party I ran into Usher and we immediately gave each other a hug. While he was holding me, he turned to the side and kind of put my neck in a playful choke hold and started squeezing me. I tried to tell him that I couldn’t breathe but he couldn’t hear me because the music was loud. It didn’t help that he was drunk. I was yelling, ‘yo, yo, yo let me go! I can’t breathe!’ He was excited to see me and he was just expressing himself with this gesture. He was so drunk he didn’t realize what he was doing.”

When you are a recording artist, your image is everything – it defines whom you are. With that said, it would be wise to always present a positive image about yourself, in this case Bobby Brown made an ominous mistake of trying to present a negative image of Usher, but in the same breath as Bobby Brown is presenting an image of Usher, Bobby comes off looking bad also. It can be said that Bobby Brown was the King of R&B for awhile before the Reality shows and the coke; Usher grew up on images of Bobby Brown and was no doubt influenced by him. Now, Usher can be viewed as the King of R&B, and it is kind of sad that Bobby Brown appeared to be helpless as Usher had in a ‘playful choke’. I mean, you want to have the appearance that you can hold your own and be a ‘man’ – but this situation has Bobby Brown looking like a real b*tch as he was pleading for mercy from the might ‘Usher’ … I don’t even want to get into the metaphorical symbolism that is laced in this incident.

So for you new artists’ out there, especially the dudes, in your press interviews & sound bites, you want to come-off as a man that can stand on his own, not as a man that is pleading for help and comes off as effeminate … not a good look.

.:: d.b ::.

Hip-Hop

VLot Case #118: "So I don’t give a f* what none of y’all n* say; Cause anything that can’t penetrate ricochets"

November 2, 2006 d dot b Leave a comment

“So I don’t give a f*** what none of y’all n*** say; Cause anything that can’t penetrate ricochets”
— Canibus ‘How We Roll’, 1998, a case study from www.vacantlot.org Intelli-Hip Hop

Self-esteem is a pertinent issue that affects all of us from childhood to adulthood. In childhood, our self-esteem is exposed to several ‘tests’ that either create a positive or negative self-esteem. Of course social, psychological, and environmental factors will all dictate how one responds to these ‘tests’. However, this proverbial wisdom quote refers to the ‘diss’ approach of self-esteem; that is discrediting a person’s character with insults that may be true or untrue. It is also worthy to note that these acts of discrediting is usually done directly and with a malicious nature (intent to afflict emo-pain).

Thus, this quote implies that one has a positive (high) self-esteem which translates into any attempts to lower their self-esteem is repelled. To attain this, one is confident in themselves; which may be also a sign that one only tries to lower another’s self-esteem because their self-esteem is also low – bringing one down may bring another up. Such individuals can be labelled shallow and transparent: which may explain why this quote suggests that insults are ricocheted back to the sender when one is mentally deep and understands their psyche.

.:: Find more quotes at www.vacantlot.org
An in-depth look at the quotes that affect our lives

Logic

VLot Case #115: "A wise man told me not to argue with fools, because people from a distance can’t tell who is who."

November 2, 2006 d dot b Leave a comment

“A wise man told me not to argue with fools, because people from a distance can’t tell who is who.”
— Jay-Z , case study from www.vacantlot.org

This quote is one of my favorite quotes as I feel that it speaks truth; so many people like to argue with non-sensical logic — it is almost baffling at times. Actually, this quote is derived from an 18th century english proverb, but has a timeless essence because ‘fools’ will always exist.
Foolish logic has many traits, but most notably when one encounters someone who is foolish, the following characteristics will become apparent:
– Unwilling/Unreceptive to differing ideas; inability to compromise
– Argumentum ad hominem: does not stick to the argument, goes off topic
– Talks loud and uses vulgar language
– Circular argumentation: goes around in circles; does not stick to the argument.
– Stubborn attitude

Dialogue with people of this nature will not solve an issue, but rather it might make the situation worse; as both individuals will look ‘foolish’. Nothing can amount to nothing, and engaging with a fool will yield the same.

Misconception
A common misconception of ‘fools’ are those individuals that may come from a poor background – to be foolish does not necessarily derive from one’s socio-economic status. But more so, ‘fools’ manipulate the world around them by assinine behavior to satisfy their appetitie.

Conclusion
In the end, this maxim suggests that nothing can be accomplished when arguing with a fool — except that one is deemed a fool also, for trying to intellectually engaging a fool.

.:: More quotes at www.vacantlot.org

Love, Relationships

Women, and their self-fulfulling prophecy of misery Pt. 1

October 22, 2006 d dot b Leave a comment

I am not really one to be writing about relationships and crap, but I figured I will give it a try.

Quick run-down:
Boy knows girl for several years; they kept in touch but sporadically. Girl felt like Boy was just going after her goodies; which was kinda true, but over time – boy matured and girl felt that level of maturity, so girl and boy start talking. However, Girl has broken up with her ex 6-8 months) before girl reconnects with boy. Girl likes Boy, vice versa. Girl thinks and professes that boy is great, ideal, and really likes Boy (also thinks that Boy is a great communicator, compromiser, and intelligent) – thus, girl initiates a date. On date both have a good time, enjoy each others company, date ends with a kiss. However, girl is overwhelmed with feelings of joy/bliss, but is conflicted with her ex (mind you, who cheated and disrespected her). Thus, girl panics and freaks out (which I dont understand). Ignores Boy for several weeks and ignores his phone calls. Finally, Girl sees the errs in her ways, and contacts Boy and says that she is sorry for her actions, but Boy is upset that girl would treat her this way … sorry for the ‘quick run-down’

Now, besides knowing that naturally, women are generally screwed; as is, they have no idea of knowing what they want in life and/or a man. Why can’t women acknowledge and respect when they have a good thing in their life. If girl felt this way, knowing that boy is understanding and is a good communicator, girl should have told boy her feelings – NOT ignore boy like a chicken head (or insert appropriate regional word). That is my qualm. Every action is a reciprocal equal or greater action, and though Boy wishes Girl good luck, i’m sure Boy wishes her some equal/greater treatment as she showed to him, by some other boy … ya dig??

Lemme know what y’all think (women: sorry for the generalizations, but you know what it is already!!).

Life in B Major