An Arizona Teenager Was Fatally Stabbed. The Suspect Blames Rap Music.

[conuly]

I've got another explanation, buddy. It starts with an r and it rhymes with "day schism".

I must say, putting aside his stated motive, I have to wonder what his thought processes are that he thinks telling people that this is why he did it is a good idea.

Comments

[siderea]

So this is a big topic on which I'm not prepared to go into a full disquisition, but the history of the Satanic Panic has crossed my desk recently (from two directions no less), and I've been particularly struck by how the Satanic Panic was about the imagined bad behavior of (some) white people. So, long story short: no, I don't think it was? It was heavy metal that the crusaders against satanism were so incensed by, and back then, heavy metal and rap/hip-hop were seen as, er, antithetical. And very, very racially segregated. Also, to my knowledge rap may have always had heavy crime (gangsta) themes, it didn't go in for the satanic imagery that caused the uproar.

Which is not to say that rap wasn't despised by some of the same sorts of people at the same time. Wikipedia has a good rundown of the contemporaneous controversies around gangsta rap, which apparently did not get sucked into that crazy.

[silveradept]

Thank you! I wouldn't have been surprised at all if it had been included, but I guess rap and that became more of a general thing pious people be children needed "saving" from instead.