BlogStar

A guide to making a Hip-Hop Blog

Its been a minute since I have actually ‘written’ anything on the blog; notice the word ‘written’. Due to a busy and demanding schedule I had to resort to what my peers do so often – post Youtube/video clips. Now, there isn’t anything really wrong with that – heck, if a video is worth posting, then one should post it, right? And that is what many of my peers (the hip-hop/black blogs) seem to be doing constantly as they post the newest and latest audio track from Drake, Weezy, or Gucci Mane (which baffles me). To get into it, I have noticed that many of the hip-hop blogs out there have the same content, sometimes the posts are in the same order – meaning that they are importing a feed from somewhere. And I was like ‘wow’, this is really lame. Its good to see that the hip-hop/black blogs are out there, but people are not really giving opinions, no fresh ideas, or insightful wisdom is coming out – just regurgitated content coming from a few sources. So I had to ask myself ‘why is this the case?’, I mean the supply of content is plentiful, so why isn’t there varied content ranging from entertainment to social, psychological, and political issues? Or is the demand only focused on the entertainment?

Steps to Blog Fame

So with that said, I thought it would be prudent for aspiring blog ‘writers’ to have a guide as to how to produce and maintain a blog:

1. Cool Name

- Take a common phrase from hip-hop culture, like ‘Swagsterboys.com’ or ‘onthecorner.com’ or some other madness

2. Jack Off

Not literally, but if you do, do ya thing. But this refers to where you pull your content from, many bloggers like yourself get their content from RapRadar, Allhiphop, hiphopdx, worldstarhiphop, and vladtv. If you are ‘tech with it’, you can even take their feed URL, burn their feed with FeedBurner, and re-publish that feed for your own creative, unique, and suave blog.
- www.google.com/feedburner for more info

3. Collective Commentary

Of course you must distinguish yourself from the others, so what other way to do that than to comment on the content you ripped. The sharp and quick one-liners add flavor to your blog; even though the one-liners may be from the source you got the video from – hey, its ok, its still your own hands that wrote it!

4. That’s a wrap!

I mean, there is nothing else more to do right? Just mention your blog to your friends, your social network, and claim to have the latest and best content!

With the sarcasm aside, maybe I am expecting too much from these blogs, maybe I need to understand that this is only a section of hip-hop/black blogs. I mean, there are many good blogs on AOL’s BlackVoices.com, but outside of that, I don’t think there are much more. Maybe I am confusing the relationship between hip-hop & black blogs – though I am finding that most of the Black Blogs ARE hip-hop blogs. And then, maybe, just maybe, I shouldn’t complain as much as I am in my own lane, and I can actually string together words to make sentences, that makes paragraphs, that makes a ‘thought’ or an ‘idea’ ….

Step your game up peers.

.:: LiBM ::.

Image by snoppy

Increasing Probability

Changing the variables to produce a better result for the Black Family

As a society; parents, children, brothers & sisters, the best we can do is increase the probability of success. There is not an absolute definitive formula that if practiced, will guarantee that a child will grow up ’successfully’; there is a combination of social and economic factors that can lead the best of children to a life of violence and/or drugs. Thus, we can only try to increase the probabilities of a positive result by trying to control the variables. Especially in the Black community, it is very important that we try to control these variables as too many of our youth slip through the cracks.

Spending time with your kids and doing family activities
Sounds pretty basic, and it is – just doing communal activities such as watching TV together, grocery shopping, cooking, walking, can yield positive effects on youth. In today’s climate, we are all busy – some working multiple jobs to get by, but even just making a phone call to see what is going on with your kids can foster a relationship of warmth and dialogue; and the more dialogue that you have with your children, the better chances are that they will come to you for guidance when something is troubling them in their lives. As the parent, you must be an authoritative figure, but you must not always exercise your title with an iron fist – yelling/screaming will not develop a relationship of open dialogue; as the child will most likely not be willing to discuss their problems with you. Parents must be open to dialogue and discourse or face a child that is unwilling to share and open up.

Positive reinforcement
Positive reinforcement is an increase in the future frequency of a behavior due to the addition of a stimulus immediately following a response. Giving (or adding) food to a dog contingent on its sitting is an example of positive reinforcement. Essentially this means ‘reward youth’, when they do good, it may be best to show a tangible appreciation (if possible, like a gift or item), or at least an intangible appreciation such as accolades and praise. The common argument I heard growing up for when I do good is ‘well, that is what you should be doing’, which has some merits, but rewarding youth for their performance is a preparation for the real work world – where bonuses are giving to those that perform well. As with the real work world, once a person receives a bonus, they will try hard to maintain their behavior that led them to that award; thus, promising your kids a specific video game or outing for their performance may be advantageous – and if they fail to meet the achieved requirement, still supplement them with something that is appropriate, because you do not want them to feel resentment towards you.

Avoiding Displacement
As with everything, from time to time we may have problems with our significant others, work, school, or just the mundane annoyances of life, but that doesn’t mean that we have to displace our frustrations to our children. Displacement operates in the mind unconsciously, and involves emotions, ideas, or wishes being transferred from their original object to a more acceptable substitute. It is most often used to allay anxiety. That safe ‘acceptable substitute’ is usually our children, as they become the recipient for our frustrations.

When reading the statistics on the black family, the numbers are alarming and troubling – as a whole, we all need to be better educated on familial relationships techniques and inner dynamics. Being aware of such will hopefully lead to better independent and familial functioning for both the child and the parent. Now for some of the rough statistics, ‘rough’ as in ‘bad’:

The net worth of a black fmaily in America is $5988 versus a white family of $88651

9 million Blacks in the U.S. are in poverty.

U.S. Black women outnumbered Black males in every decade of the Twentieth Century.

White Males with a high-school diploma are just as likely to have a job and tend to earn just as much as black males with college degrees

Approximately 60% of children in public kinship care are African American.

45% of Black Children live below the poverty line, compared with 16% of White children

Although African American youth account for 15% of the U.S.
population, they account for 26% of juvenile arrests, 31% of delinquency referrals to juvenile court, 44% of juveniles detained in delinquency cases, 40% in residual placements, 46% of juveniles transferred to adult criminal court, and 58% admitted to state prisons.

African American students account for 14.8% of the general population for the 6 through 21 age group, compared with 20.2% of the special education population in all disabilities. 18.3% are diagnosed with a specific learning disability, 34.3% are diagnosed with mental retardation and 26.4% are diagnosed as being emotionally disturbed.

Although African American youth account for only 15% of the
juvenile population, more African American juveniles than white
juveniles were murdered between 1988 and 1995.

Source: http://www.blackangelnetwork.org/?q=stats

Knowledge is power …
.:: LiBM ::.

The Broken Black Family, Open the banks late, and girly Hypocrisy

Banking Hours
On a trip to NYC in early ‘09, I noticed something so amazing and logical – Banking Hours should be complimentary to our working hours. The normal working hours are 9-5 Monday thru Fridays; most banks close at like 4 or 5, or they may open late on a Thursday or Friday to 6 or 8. I have to give TD Canada Trust some credit for having most of their banks open until 8 Monday thru Fridays, and Saturday open till like 3 or 4. But back to the point of this rant, in NYC, they have banks open 7 days a week; apparently and coincidentally, TD Waterhouse is holding it down out there with banks open until late and open on both days of the weekend. And it makes sense, get customers in when they have the most time; if there is a specific transaction that has to be done on a weekday, process as much as you can on the weekend, then finalize it on Monday morning. BMO, RBC, CIBC – get with the program!

Family Time
Sitting in a City Park over the weekend with the girlfriend, and something good and sad at the same time became apparent. The good: there is still a strong sense that when the weather is nice families like to go to the park and bond with each other; whether it is a BBQ, volleyball, or just a walk in the park. The bad: we didn’t see much black families partaking in this; there was an abundance of white, Asian, and Indian families all spending time with each other in an urban city park. Now maybe, I am reading a bit too much into it; and I have a tendency to find correlations between unseemingly unrelated things, but I think that the lack of representation can be likened to the bigger problem of the state of the Black Family. It is known that the Black Family is in a state of repair; trying to mend the cloth that was ripped by slavery as slave masters deliberately broke up members of Black family to demoralize their spirit. And ever since then, the black family, in comparison to other races, do not have the same strong bond as others. The one good thing about Tyler Perry films is that it emphasizes the importance of family – guess they are good for something, lol.

Hypocrisy
Its always a satisfying moment when you catch your girlfriend in her own hypocritical ish. Ahh, its refreshing and invigorating. And when they get caught in it, they get quite like a mouse, and try to make up some rubbish excuse that is unique to their current situation. However, you should be subtle and not take it overboard in your tangent/rip into their hypocrisy, rather take the ‘You-know-that-I-know-that-you-have-just-been-caught-in-your-own-ish’ approach, and save the card for a rainy to day to credit when you trip up!

.:: LiBM ::.

Black Like Me
Virtues: race, distinction, etiology

Black like me, like who? Whether your background is Caribbean, American, or African, if you are black you share traits – people look at you with common expectations. However, amongst black people, we like to distinguish ourselves from each other, even though we essentially come from the same place – Africa. My background is Caribbean, but now I reside in North America (Toronto to be specific), and I once talked to this African woman; I thought that it would be just as usual if I was talking to a Jamaican or Trini, but I soon realized that I felt that our cultures were so different; I almost thought that I was dating a white girl. I was learning about different foods, traditions, heritage, attitudes that I thought that I should know (because we share the same race), but I was grossly mistaken.

Historical Sense
In North America, you generally have two classes of black people: domesticated/westernized blacks & Africans. The former group comes from a diverse background; they have either migrated from the Caribbean islands and/or are the offspring of slavery. From the shores of Halifax Nova Scotia which was Canada’s first black population settlement, to the deep south of Mississippi, there is similarity of a shared struggle throughout history that exists even to this day; their heritage only spans from somewhere in the 1800’s – anytime before that, and the details of their heritage gets sketchy, fuzzy, like channel ‘01’. Similarly, the Caribbean people that have migrated to Canada & the U.S. for better prosperity share a similar heritage-like progression as they too have lost details about their history from around the 1800’s and even early 1900’s. This is significant to the domesticated/westernized blacks because they have a loss of culture; a loss of roots.

I know the enlightened person is like, ‘you shouldn’t group Caribbean’s with domesticated westernized blacks because their culture is different’, such a person would be right; but they share the same etiology – the etiology they share is different from African blacks.

Noticeable Differences
It is the etiology that essentially creates the distinction and divide that exists amongst blacks – so much so that both groups are prejudice to each other. And with all types of prejudice behavior – it is a result of a lack of knowledge and respect for others. Meaning, that the Westernized blacks may know about the history of Africa (i.e. slavery), but currently, the Westernized blacks do not know much about the current state of their brethren across the Atlantic. According to the media, Africa is still full of savages, AIDS, poverty, and tribes.

In my experiences, both groups have an inherent bias towards themselves. The domesticated/westernized blacks believe that they are better than the Africans because they have been in the West longer, understand the western culture & ideals better, and have better language skills. Whereas, the Africans believe that they are better than the domesticated/westernized blacks because they believe that they have more heritage, know their roots, and are more ‘black’ (pure) than their brethren. So basically, this correlates into a subdued (or at times overt) attitude that people develop of ‘frowning’ and/or ‘looking down’ on others. Which really shouldn’t be the case, because in the end, while we battle ‘looking down’ at each other, the ‘man’ is looking down at us – laughing, exploiting as usual.

Think about that!

.:: d.b

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Why they are the way they are
Virtues: Perseverance, Strength, Courage, Black Women

It has been said that black women have an attitude.

Not only do they have attitude, but they are opinionated, calculating, and have a low tolerance for … just about anything.

They move swiftly throughout; strong & defiant to get what they want.

You dare not argue with black women because you will lose; even if you are right, trust me, you will lose some other way.

We have classified black women as Bitches; because their opinions clash with our alpha-male persona.
We call them hood rats because their Fathers have abandoned them and have forced the single-mother to fend for themselves with a dependent(s) in a decaying environments.
We objectify them in pop culture as video vixens that are only as relevant as their ‘assets’ or their willingness to please others (RE: Karine ‘Superhead’ Steffans).
We call them hoes as a way to characterize their promiscuous lifestyle, but for men, that same promiscuity is revered & receives adoration.

So, I get it. Black women will drive you crazy; they will be pesky, vocal, and confrontational. Black women don’t put up with shit – they deserve better & will not settle for less.
So yeah, the attitude is there, but is a manifestation of how they have been treated over generations; they have been shitted on forever, but are now doing the dumping.

And that is why they ‘are’ the way they ‘are’.

.:: d.b