Kush and Orange Juice...among other various illegal substances

Check out these videos. A couple of my favorites!






A couple days ago I was listening to my Itunes library and began to notice that many of the songs that we're playing had the same theme. They were all about drugs! Now granted I didn't turn them off, and I won't be skipping them on my ipod because they're extremely catchy. But I am trying to figure out now why it is okay for music to have such subject matter in it. Although the videos I have posted above our from the rap genre, there are more songs I discovered about drugs such as "Cocaine" by Eric Clapton, and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" by The Beatles.

When did it become so socially acceptable to discuss drugs to the extent that it is present in music nowadays? It was always known that people smoked marijuana, since the 60s when the hippie's wanted peace and at Woodstock when all types of drugs were in circulation. But we must remember that such substances are banned!!! In the above video very popular rapper Lil' Wayne speaks about various drug after effects in "I Feel Like Dying". It is common knowledge that the Styrofoam cup he is often photographed with contains a mixture known as "Lean" a mixture of cough syrup (mainly codine as referenced in the song "jumping off of a mountain into a sea of codine") and alcohol. He also mentions marijuana numerous times similar to the other artist's video I posted, Wiz Khalifa, whose highly anticipated mixtape Kush and Orange Juice contains countless tracks dedicated to marijuana. The song "In the Cut" speaks about smoking weed as soon as he awakens in the morning.

The issue at hand here is that we can not stop today's youth from listening to this type of music. It is what's popular and catchy (if I do say so myself) yet does not portray a positive message. In the same manner that the Kiely Williams "Sex is Spectacular" video depicts an inaccurate representation of the wonderful sex you can have while under the influence, songs such as these may be encouraging today's youth to use drugs in order to either escape problems, be creative thinkers or just for recreational purposes.

Also a large majority of songs about drugs are of the rap genre, which cater specifically towards the black community. This can cause an increase of drug use within a community that is already falling apart from violence, and financial troubles. Many people see music as their escape. If this is what they're listening to what will they use to escape next?

Here's a video for the road!

Reality TV

"Where are you! You STUPID BITCH!!" -Classic Portia Quote



Classic Flavor of Love episodes

The first reality television show that I'm familiar with is Fear Factor, and I never watched it because it was so gross I couldn't stomach it. But wow TV has come a long way to provide wonderful, educational and age appropriate programming for everyone!
NOT!
Now I'm going to admit right now that I LIVE for Bad Girls Club. Every Tuesday I made sure I was free at 9pm Central Time (DePaul doesnt have Oxygen channel therefore hindering me watching episodes faithfully like back in high school). I'm a sucker for the drama as I'm sure millions are, and that's why channels like MTV, VH1 and Oxygen love us. They cater to our desires and in return we provide them with high ratings. For example the first season of Flavor Of Love, Flava Flav chose Hoops over New York. From this show spun I Love New York 1 and 2 in addition to a 2nd and 3rd season of Flavor of Love. Countless other shows have been created as well with celebrities searching for love, normally ending in them choosing a person who they do not even end up staying with for long. But while the shows last there's plenty of fights, arguments and generally interesting drama that one can kick back after a long day of school and enjoy unfold on the screen before you while you think "if i was there..!!!" or "glad that's not my life" (especially in the case of the MTV show 16 & Pregnant)

But reality TV isn't limited to just dating shows anymore! And not all the shows are negative. Celebrity Fit Club creates a competition where overweight celebrities compete in various activities and whoever loses the most weight during the show wins. This creates a positive image, because when viewers see their favorite celebrity making an effort to get healthy, and see how good they look in the end, more people will be willing to get in shape.

There are numerous reality tv shows some may have a central purpose (Scream Queens looked for the next female to star in Saw VI), looking for love (Tila Tequila had it hard!), or the betterment of ones self (Bad Girl's Club original aim was to deal with anger issues and things of that nature that the girl's possessed, I don't know what the purpose is anymore however, there were more fights this season than last couple seasons combined). So when is reality TV going to DO something for the viewer? And what do we want it to do besides entertain us? I would like to see more College Life shows. I would gladly watch someone chronicle a semester in college and see it turn out positively so that I can feel like "I can do it too!". Or a show chronicling a woman's battle with STD's or Pregnancy then going around to different schools speaking to them about safe sex methods and ways to stay protected (because my friends from Texas say they never learned anything but abstinence based education).

Where for art thou quality reality television?
Here's a link to a listing of all reality tv shows http://www.realitytvworld.com/realitytvworld/allshows.shtml

When Disney Channel Fails

Innocence is Bliss GIRL POWER right, note the African American girl that isn't Raven Symone. Check out your daughter/little sister/niece's favorite role model now!(More importantly listen to the lyrics!)



I remember when Cheetah Girls was my favorite movie. It was so empowering and all the Cheetah Girls were sooo pretty, with gorgeous voices and could do no wrong. Oh Disney Channel why do you diminish my role model down to nothing? If the video filmed for this song isn't bad, the lyrics will sure make up for any raunchiness that wasn't added into the video. I am truly concerned about this new 'Kiely Williams' and what it means for younger generations. Fair enough many Disney Channel stars have branched off to develop music careers, such as Hilary Duff, Raven Symone, the Jonas Brothers, Ally and AJ and others. However, having appeared on Disney Channel the music that they make has always catered to younger audiences in an effort to maintain viewers of their television shows and movies. But what audience is Kiely trying to reach here? The sexually-active youth of America? Sadly, there is no positivity in this song! The basic gist is that she got excessively drunk, and had really good sex. She's not sure if she was drugged or if she even used a condom! Now what kind of example does this set for America's teenager? If this video and Kiely's actions are believed to be the Hegemonic Norm, there are going to be large numbers of underage females running around getting extremely drunk so that they can have tons of fun and experience the "spectacular" sex that Kiely has. The world has already shown that it falls easily into false consciousness, and since Kiely was a former Cheetah Girl and role model, will younger girls be influenced by this new image? The teen pregnancy rates will tell...

Degrassi (The Next Generation, and The Next, and the NEXT)

The other day I was watching old episodes of Degrassi (back when Degrassi was awesome) and I ended up seeing the one about Manny thinking she was pregnant and how she got an abortion at the end of the episode. I then remembered that it took quite sometime for this episode to be seen in United States (as the show originates in Canada) because the topic of abortion was highly controversial while Ex-President Bush was in office. I began to wonder why such topics as abortion can be banned from television, but teenage pregnancy is allowed to be depicted as frequently as it is. Tv shows such as The Secret Life of the American Teenager and movies such as Fifteen and Pregnant are all depictions of pregnancy during the teenage years. Sadly, these mediums give an unrealistic example of pregnancy and the consequences of one's actions. Do you really believe that Manny would get an abortion, and no one would ever mention it again and she'd go on living happily ever after? NO. Degrassi should have incorporated Manny's emotions after the abortion into additional episodes, and shown her peers' reaction, because in today's society it is hard to keep something of that nature of secret, and not receive a great deal of negativity from peers. Also the media tends to portray teenage pregnancy in a positive light! The intro to Secret Life is bright, and summery with happy colors, and in the show the girl is still considerably happy even though she just gave birth to a child at her ripe age. If the media continues to label teenage pregnancy as something that's "in" and never shows the negative side, teenagers are going to continue to get pregnant and have unprotected sex because the consequences that they see do not negatively reinforce the notion of safe sex. We all know that the media play a huge role in the life of many individuals, it would only be right to use the media to send a message or a warning. Otherwise we will keep having babies raising babies.