(ThyBlackMan.com) I think I speak for a lot of normal black people when I say that I sometimes grow tired of the rapper Rick Ross. Ross has always been a creative, yet relatively useless public figure in the past, but his recent disrespect for the legacy of Trayvon Martin might be the straw that breaks the fat man’s back. Rick’s use of Trayvon’s name in the song “Mastermind” might be subject to interpretation, and he’s being very careful to try to brush it over. But when you put these lyrics into context, you realize that Ross using the name Trayvon Martin in any song isn’t usually going to do anything for anyone but himself.
Here are a few reasons that Rick Ross should find something else to rap about and probably keep Trayvon Martin’s name out of his mouth.
1) Trayvon is dead: Maybe you didn’t mean any harm with your lyrics about Trayvon, but the fact is that Trayvon Martin and his legacy are sacred. Using a dead teenager for target practice is off limits, and your advisors should have known better. Whether it is Nicki Minaj using Malcolm’s image on an album cover, or Lil Wayne comparing Emmett Till’s face to a woman’s v@gina, there must come a day when toxic hip-hop artists are made aware that the black community is not going to allow you to sell every inch of our culture and heritage to the white man who
pays you the most money. Hip-hop was meant to SERVE black people, not SELL them.
2) You don’t have anything useful to say: When the world was protesting Trayvon Martin’s brutal murder, you were smoking blunts with your “niggaz” in the booth and trying to make more money. The only time Trayvon Martin, or any kind of black struggle enters your conscience is when you think you can make money off of it. Maybe instead of commercializing Trayvon’s death for your own selfish purposes, you can get off your butt and fight for something worthwhile. Ross has gladly taken millions of dollars to use his urban influence to get black kids to buy expensive sneakers they can’t afford, but rarely does he use that influence to get them to do something positive.
3) You’re a fraud: I happen to be friends with the real Freeway Ricky Ross, the man who controlled much of the drug trade on the West Coast 20 years ago. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that you have the same name as Mr Ross, and I’m astonished that he hasn’t been able to successfully sue you for tens of millions of dollars you’ve earned by using that name as your own. What makes you even more fraudulent is that you were once a law abiding citizen who is now earning millions of dollars glorifying the very same behavior that the original Rick Ross has forsaken. So, as Rick goes around the country telling young people to learn from his mistakes, you are begging young black men to repeat them
4) You’ve made yourself worthless to the African American community: Maybe some people are impressed by the fact that, during the age of corporatized black psychological genocide, you’re able to gain respect from some because you have a lot of money. But I’m a Finance professor, and I am able to see beyond the money to assess what you actually are: A morbidly obese, self-destructive, possibly drug addicted, over-tatooed, sexually-irresponsible monstrocity of a human-being who might likely be dead before the age of 45. You spend your life spitting one poisonous verse after another that only increases the likelihood that more black men will end up shot, in prison or infected with STDs.
Here’s just a random sample of some “classic” Rick Ross lyrics:
“Designer jeans, and a hand full of dough (Yeah) Bottle of the Jose, pass me some more I got, more cars, more cars, more clothes, more clothes more money means more dough to blow (blow) more money means more dough to blow (blow) more money means more dough for blow”
I hate to say this my brother, but YOU-ARE-THE-ENEMY. There is almost nothing that comes out of your mouth that will help any black man become empowered to protect himself against all of the forces out there that are designed to destroy him. You’re pretty much teaching black men to become sitting ducks and partners in their own oppression.
The bottom line for Rick Ross or anyone else who is determined to destroy both hip-hop music and the African American community is that WE DON’T NEED YOU. You can make your money, smoke your weed, drink your liquor and do whatever you want while sitting on the sidelines, but don’t get in the mix when real black people are trying to do something productive.
Trayvon Martin means far more to the rest of us than a convenient and profitable rap verse. He was a precious young black male who gave something to the black community that will never be forgotten. So, the same way people want to hang George Zimmerman by his testicles for stalking and killing Trayvon, we should be equally diligent in dealing with hip-hop artists who are determined to urinate on all that remains good about being black.
This kind of ignorance should not be tolerated, and we must deal with it by any means necessary.
Staff Writer; Dr. Boyce Watkins
Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition. For more information, please visit http://BoyceWatkins.com.