A Book to Read

One book that I recently read I would recommend to anybody.  The name of the book is “Freakonomics,” by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner.  This novel is based on economics and they reveal a lot of unhidden truths about our society.  Steven D. Levitt is an economist. Stephen J. Dubner is a writer. They co-authored Freakonomics, a book about cheating teachers, bizarre baby names, self-dealing Realtors, and crack-selling mama’s boys. They figured it would sell about 80 copies. Instead, it has sold 4 million, in 35 languages. Then they wroteSuperFreakonomics. It also became a worldwide best-seller. A lot of other stuff happened, too. A blog. A movie. A radio show. Jon Stewart and Beauty and the Geek. A pair of pants! Now, at long last, all things Freakonomics are here in one place. Welcome to the new Freakonomics.com.  Some of the bizarre questions they ask in the book are things like “Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? How did the legalization of abortion affect the rate of violent crime?”  After you read this book, you’ll have a different opinion on how and why we do the things we do in our economy and Levitt covers a lot of topics in an interesting and catchy way.  It’s a must read!

Movie Review

One movie I would recommend everybody to watch is , “Don’t be a Menace in South Central while Drinking your Juice in the Hood” yes that’s the title…all of that.  The movie was produced and written by the wayans family.  Directed by Paris Barclay produced by Keenan Ivory Wayans.  Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood is a 1996 hood film/comedy film. Similar to the Wayans' previous effort I'm Gonna Git You Sucka, the film spoofs a number of black, coming-of-age, 'hood films' such as Juice, Jungle Fever, South Central, Higher Learning, Do The Right Thing, Poetic Justice, New Jack City, Dead Presidents, Friday, and most prominently Boyz n the Hood and Menace II Society, all primarily released between 1988 and 1995, and also mixes the names of a few of those titles to form the long title of the film. Some actors in the film also starred in the films the movie parodies, a few even in the same scenes and characters.  I really like the movie because it sends messages in a comedic aspect.  They cover a lot of controversial topics and stereotypes such as, single families, teenage parents, drugs, alcohol, police, and society as whole.  Movies such as Scary Movie 1-however many of them there are get their ideas of spoofing a lot of movies to make one big funny movie from this movie.

Art Review

The Artistic Bombing Crew, better known as ABC, are a graffiti group from a neighborhood in Chicago called Logan Square and these artist originated in the mid 1980s.  The group is known for tagging on property in the Logan Square and the rest of the North side Chicago area.  They’re most famously known for their tagging on the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) trains.  The graffiti on the trains were considered a million dollar problem according to the CTA chief administrative officer.  In the 1980s, the police department made an intense effort to catch and arrest any tagger they would see in the Chicago area.  It was so hard to catch these taggers because they did most of their work at night and they wore all black or even camouflage so the police would have a hard time seeing and catching the vandals.  ABC has caught a number of headlines in newspapers.  Here are some of the names of the articles ABC grased :

Chicago Sun-Times- “Yearly CTA Graffiti Tab is $1 Million (1985)

Chicago Tribune- “Writing’s on the Wall: CTA’s Graffiti Worsens” (1985)

Chicago Reader- Excerpt (1985)

Chicago Tribune- “Gangs play Graffiti Tag, CTA’s It!” (1985)  

Spraycan Art (1987)

Chicago Suntimes- “Exhibit Tags Graffiti as Art” (1985)

Chicago Suntimes – “Tag it as Art, Graffiti Gang gets a Patron” (1989)

Chicago Reader- “Art Faces: Neo-Graffiti by Erik Debat, aka Risk” (1990

We have the Right

I think we should have to right to sample other people’s instrumentals and different sounds to make new music.  I really don’t see the reason on people suing other people for using sometimes only like 5 seconds of somebody’s song.  Some people believe that sampling is an exhibition of a lack of creativity.  I, on the other hand, don’t think of it that way.  You also have to have a level of creativity to even construct a new version and instrumental that was already used before.  Sometimes you speed the sample up, or you slow it down to match whatever tempo or style you’re trying to pursue.  But if that’s the game people want to play with the whole sampling business, and then individuals should also be paid for their drum set pieces.  I can’t count how many times I’ve heard the same snare pattern on a song over and over and over again.  Those people don’t get paid a dime.  But the one hit wonders who are short on money and need to be petty get all of the money when they hear 3 tenths of a second of one of their songs played.  If you’re going to play the game, play the game fairly.  

X is known

Malcolm X is known throughout the entire world and I think that everybody knows his story and his teachings.  Even though X is known throughout the world, people still favor Martin Luther King.  The reason why I believe that Martins teachings are implemented more that Malcolm simply because Martin was more peaceful than Malcolm.  Martin believe more of a “let’s wait and see if the white man will change their ways” type of attitude, hence his famous “Letters from Birmingham Jail.”  Martin thought that whites knew that they were doing wrong but eventually they’ll realize that they were in the wrong and they’ll finally come to peace with blacks.  This indeed wasn’t the case but Martin was at a standstill.  Malcolm, on the other hand had a view that if the white man wasn’t going to give it to him, he would take it.  He didn’t wait for anybody to give him stuff and he didn’t act for favoritism.  He wanted everything allocated fair and square.  In the speech, “Ballot or the Bullet, “Malcolm describes how if the white man can’t treat the black man equally, he wants to disassociate the black race with the white race and start their own community.  Idk, I just think that the media would rather respect a black man who doesn’t fight back in opposed to a black man who fights.

X marks the spot

X marks the spot where people defend for themselves and don’t take s*** from anybody.  There’s a little bit of Malcolm X in everybody.  Whenever you have an extreme view or belief about something and you’re willing to fight for it, that’s the Malcolm X in you.  Everybody has a little bit on rebellious attributes in they’re personality.  I don’t know why this is but hey, you can’t do anything about it.  When people think about Malcolm X, the first thing that comes to mind is that he’s just this violent soul that hates the white race.  I don’t think that’s the case.  I think that Malcolm just thought that blacks weren’t getting a fair chance to succeed in life so that’s what angered him.  All the opportunities that were provided for the whites weren’t provided for the blacks and I really don’t know why.  So I kind of see why Malcolm did some of the stuff he did and said some of the stuff he said because it was out of anger.