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Whiteboys (The Movie)

© Steve Juon

The newest joke of the month, or a serious look at the politics of race relations in hip-hop? From the trailers for this movie, it's a little hard to tell.

Quite frankly as a hip-hop activist, I'm a little bit concerned that this movie may actually widen the gap between races instead of bringing people together. This has already been a tulmutous year as far as hip-hop is concerned given the amazingly rapid rise of rock'n'roll artists incorporating hip-hop rhymes and turntables into their music. The explosion in popularity of groups like Korn and Limp Bizkit has fueled an increasing (and justifiable) suspicion of an attempt on the part of white America to incorporate and rewrite hip-hop to fit it's own agenda, just as happened to jazz, the blues, and rock.

Given this, the timing of the movie is needless to say apt; and the inclusion of hip-hop celebre Bonz Malone as the voice of reason seems to give it some balance. Still and all, the fact that the characters are ostensibly some "Iowa gangster thugs" achieves three things: it mocks white people as ignorant, it mocks people from the midwest as ignorant, and it mocks what is a very real and legitimate interest in hip-hop by a variety of people who are not black -- and I don't just mean whites. Big Punisher is blowing up, but a movie called "Hispanicboys" wouldn't be that funny would it? Or a movie about the Mountain Brothers called "Asianboys". I think you get the idea.

Peace, Flash