[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPlLdMTSIGg&eurl=http://pinboardblog.com/2009/02/14/ill-doctrine-beyond-rihanna-and-chris-brown/&feature=player_embedded]
Remember that vlog Jay Smooth did with Elizabeth Mendez Berry on Rihanna and Chris Brown? Berry wrote that dope piece in VIBE magazine about domestic violence within Hip Hop entitled “Love Hurts” some years back. Well, coz that video/conversation generated so much discussion, she has written an in-depth follow-up commentary on the subject.
…I’m posting this up because a) it’s a fascinating read and b) if I can help spread this message, that is often swept under the carpets then I will and c) coz I’m a fan of great journalism. Make yourself a cuppa, grab a biscuit and read this:
Beyond Gossip, Good and Evil
Elizabeth Mendez Berry
The Bloods have a strict policy against domestic violence. That’s what a 16-year-old male affiliate proudly told me last year before a weekly “gang awareness” meeting of about fifteen teens, most of them Crips, Bloods or Latin Kings, at a high school in Castle Hill, the Bron. That week, the topic was domestic violence, and several members of the group, including the 16-year-old, said that hitting a woman was never acceptable. Others argued that there were situations where it just couldn’t be helped.
The conversation turned to an article I had written about domestic violence in the hip hop industry for Vibe. The rapper Big Pun grew up near the high school, and his devastating abuse of his wife (which started when the couple was just 16) was described in the piece. “I heard she cheated on him,” said the only young woman in the group, and others repeated some of the many rumors that swirled around Pun’s wife when she told her story (up until then she had been Soundview’s favorite widow). Several people enthusiastically launched into scenarios where it was OK to hit a woman. There were many. The bottom line: sometimes you’ve got to teach a woman a lesson if she gets out of line. It sounded like a man’s responsibility.
In the midst of the rationalizing, one usually talkative young man stood up and walked out. When he returned twenty minutes later, he quietly told the group that his aunt had recently been murdered by her abusive boyfriend. It was no longer a hypothetical conversation. The jokes stopped. Young men who were significantly invested in their inner gangsters gave them time off, and started talking about how domestic violence had affected their lives–and it had affected most of them. The young woman, who minutes before had been arguing in favor of beating females who didn’t know their place, talked about how despite the rules, male gang members beat up on female gang members. Behind her swagger, she seemed anxious.
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