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Well here's to the beginning of the summer and the end of the academic year. It has been an interestng one.
To sum things up: I'm already over the college experience and it's "not for me." I still have three more years though. The good thing is that by next year my dorm will be like living in a NYC apartment and hopefully that'll make it possible for me to get my work done, while living the life I want to live. This is just a normal way of living, trying to get things done and make progress, enjoying the process.
This year I became quite isolated at school and hopefully that changes next semester. I'm still not going to a club, however. The isolated stance was basically my choice and had trade-offs. On one hand I got my work done successfully and learned a great deal. On the other hand, I didn't do too much with friends. At home this is never an issue.
Anyway, I'm now home for a long academic break. Of course I will be working as a lifeguard at Misquamicut, which should be a lot of fun. I also have a lot of music to make. It is important that I rest a bit too though.
Now to the political part of the post.
Most of the things I've been taking note of lately have to do with political correctness, and the thought police. This is starting to get out of control. It started with Don Imus. The people who wanted him fired saw their goal met. Due to this, the thought police realized that perhaps it was possible to win more battles. Now we have a number of shock jocks who have recently jeopardized their jobs, some who have been fired. Obviously this is no coincidence.
We are seeing an interesting situation; a 1984 scenario not initiated by the government. People are afraid of everything. Just look at this article.
http://www.contactmusic.com/news.nsf/article/protests%20come%20early%20to%20disneys%20princess_1030749 I cannot believe how much of a stretch Disney made there when considering how not to offend people. If the movie was released with all of the "offensive" material left in, I don't think I would've picked up on any of it.
Now what about rap? This is a tough one. On one hand, mainstream rap these days is mostly garbage with a negative message. It's bad for the world. I think something needs to be done, but people are going at it in the wrong way. Al Sharpton and rap icon Russel Simmons want to ban specifically the words "hoes", "bitches", and "niggers" from music. This is all wrong. Bleeping out some words, but still having the song be about "how straight up gangsta I am" gets us nowhere. It's still a negative message. Then you may have artists who wish to use the banned words in some kind of relative story which mentions them and depicts them as bad, in an overall positive message. They get bleeped too. This is the nasty path of censorship.
I think what I would do as a record company executive, is that for any new arists I sign, I should make sure that their message is a positive one. Most rap had this kind of message when it started out. You don't restrict or fire the ones with the current negative message. They naturally become old news, and uncool anyway because of the new stuff taking over. Problem naturally solved. Firing them only makes them more gangsta.
Overall, I think people need to be nice, but people need to lighten up about what is said. Frankly, everyone wins with this concept. People aren't afraid of what they say, and shock jocks don't shock anyone so they go out of business. We need to stop saying "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words shatter them to pieces."
To sum things up: I'm already over the college experience and it's "not for me." I still have three more years though. The good thing is that by next year my dorm will be like living in a NYC apartment and hopefully that'll make it possible for me to get my work done, while living the life I want to live. This is just a normal way of living, trying to get things done and make progress, enjoying the process.
This year I became quite isolated at school and hopefully that changes next semester. I'm still not going to a club, however. The isolated stance was basically my choice and had trade-offs. On one hand I got my work done successfully and learned a great deal. On the other hand, I didn't do too much with friends. At home this is never an issue.
Anyway, I'm now home for a long academic break. Of course I will be working as a lifeguard at Misquamicut, which should be a lot of fun. I also have a lot of music to make. It is important that I rest a bit too though.
Now to the political part of the post.
Most of the things I've been taking note of lately have to do with political correctness, and the thought police. This is starting to get out of control. It started with Don Imus. The people who wanted him fired saw their goal met. Due to this, the thought police realized that perhaps it was possible to win more battles. Now we have a number of shock jocks who have recently jeopardized their jobs, some who have been fired. Obviously this is no coincidence.
We are seeing an interesting situation; a 1984 scenario not initiated by the government. People are afraid of everything. Just look at this article.
http://www.contactmusic.com/news.nsf/article/protests%20come%20early%20to%20disneys%20princess_1030749 I cannot believe how much of a stretch Disney made there when considering how not to offend people. If the movie was released with all of the "offensive" material left in, I don't think I would've picked up on any of it.
Now what about rap? This is a tough one. On one hand, mainstream rap these days is mostly garbage with a negative message. It's bad for the world. I think something needs to be done, but people are going at it in the wrong way. Al Sharpton and rap icon Russel Simmons want to ban specifically the words "hoes", "bitches", and "niggers" from music. This is all wrong. Bleeping out some words, but still having the song be about "how straight up gangsta I am" gets us nowhere. It's still a negative message. Then you may have artists who wish to use the banned words in some kind of relative story which mentions them and depicts them as bad, in an overall positive message. They get bleeped too. This is the nasty path of censorship.
I think what I would do as a record company executive, is that for any new arists I sign, I should make sure that their message is a positive one. Most rap had this kind of message when it started out. You don't restrict or fire the ones with the current negative message. They naturally become old news, and uncool anyway because of the new stuff taking over. Problem naturally solved. Firing them only makes them more gangsta.
Overall, I think people need to be nice, but people need to lighten up about what is said. Frankly, everyone wins with this concept. People aren't afraid of what they say, and shock jocks don't shock anyone so they go out of business. We need to stop saying "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words shatter them to pieces."