Back in the day I used to subscribe to The Source. I never thought it was the Bible of Hip-Hop as it markets itself, but I did read it religiously. I felt like I was part of that magazine and I even had my thoughts posted in the feedback almost every time I wrote in. It was truly the magazine of HIP-HOP music, culture and politics. However those days are long gone management has changed, talented writers and good editors have come and gone, and readership has changed also. It may be up in circulation but I suspect the brightest of us left when I did, or before me. I don’t recall exactly when I bounced but I was growing increasingly impatient with the destructive antics I was noticing in the magazine. The final straw came when they published the recipe for how to make crack. I guess this was done under the guise of  “keeping it real”. I think that much of what they do now is about “Keeping it real ….. yeah, real stupid”.

Hopefully you did not see Da Sauce Awards on Black Exploitation Television (BET), a.k.a. "Bamboozle TV" at its best. Ray Benzino and David Mays should be tied up and beat with a piece of chicken along their face and neck for 2 hours (the time of the show). That was absolutely the most embarrassing show EVER, I stumbled upon it at a friends home by accident thus I feel God wanted me to see it cause I had no plans to watch it, much less catch it from the beginning.

To say it was the most embarrassing show ever, says a lot because prior to that. The most embarrassing show ever was .... oh yeah the Source Award show in 2000 which took place in the posh setting of Pasadena, California. It was moved from Los Angeles because people feared there might be some trouble. The Source did not let them down. Luckily nobody really saw this outside of a few clips of DJ Quik in a police headlock on UPN news. The 2000 Source Awards show is where a mini riot broke out involving several artists during the filming of The Source Music Awards, which of course lead police to pull the plug. Believe it or not some blame racism for the police intervention. As a result of the fight, droves of people poured out of their seats, some toward the exits of the auditorium, while up to 75 others took to the stage, according to a police statement. That show was on UPN and to their credit they did not air the fights. However, UPN knew the discussion of the fights would boost their ratings. UPN Spokesman Paul McGuire said that “those parts will be removed from the telecast. It really was just unfortunate behavior by a handful of individuals, which affected what was otherwise a great night,". When it aired on August 29 from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m more than 5 million viewers tuned in which marked a 31 % increase over the previous year but many were disappointed that they didn’t see a scuffle. The taped broadcast was almost seamless for the viewer and it was hard to tell that the auditorium had to be cleared and taping halted do to a melee.

Although the violence was a bit excessive and probably wont repeat itself for some time. It may happen again if The Source is left up to it’s own vices. Even with the disciplined Fruit Of Islam (security arm of the Nation of Islam) handling security The Source adds fuel to pending drama and then claims that there is a "State of emergency in Hip-hop". This inevitably leads to real drama. 

What hypocrisy.

Let’ s take a look. The Source gave 50-Cent 3 awards this year (although they didn’t invite him to the award show although he was out of the country at the time anyway). 50 won Best Single (Male Artist) for "In Da Club", Breakthrough Artist of the Year and Album of the Year: Get Rich or Die Tryin'. They only did this because they felt they had to, but the problem was they allowed 50-Cent's nemesis Ja-Rule to accept the Best Single award on 50's behalf. Now unless you been under a rock you know the situation with these two. It’s a dare and a diss to have this happen and they are begging for trouble.

About 3 weeks later, 50-Cent is back in New York on DJ Funkmaster Flex from Hot97's Show and he says ” I keep all my awards, I want my Source award! Just cause Eminem smashed his Source award has nothing to do with me. I want my award since they gave it to me!” So I ask, who’s gonna give it to him? Ja-Rule? Let’s be clear the Source bosses have it in for 50. They recently compiled a story accusing him of being a phony, saying he only spent about 7 months in a boot camp (which is a non violent place) for minor drug violations, which is much different not the "3 to 9" year picture he paints in his songs. While this is 100% accurate. The Source can’t be trusted to keep the reporting legit. They also claimed he was so scared of a rivals from Murder Inc. that he applied for a order of protection and proof was on a website. The website which is registered in Benzino’s hometown of Boston is probably something Ray paid to have set up. It’s a fake, The Source knew the detective on the manifest didn’t exist and it was all a lie but they  pushed it as a legit story. This unnecessary deception is a problem, it carries over. It seems most everybody can see it except Benzino and David Mays.

I don’t even think Benzino and Mays saw, what we saw. If they did they probably didn’t care or maybe they left it up to BET to edit, another case of media which doesn’t care. Many people watch The Source Awards because they suspect the participants and the organizers of it don’t care what images they present and therefore anything can happen. Those suspicions are likely magnified once BET enters the fold. Racist all over the globe probably tuned in to the cable network to witness every stereotype imaginable played out and verified for them, and if they did they were not let down.

There was some positive aspects to it all but they were outweighed by the ghetto flair and thug antics that often take over many of the most popular hip-hop events. The legendary Kurtis Blow was presented with an award and mentioned in his speech that the night was good so far because their was no fight. It’s a shame if we feel that all it takes to denote good or excellence is that there were no fights, maybe we were embarrassed this year more than in 2000.

It could be the presentation was so awful because Miami rappers are mostly considered “country”. I am not sure if it’s still a secret that many of them fit a unwanted black stereotype. To most onlookers not reared in the South. They lack the necessary sophistication to be on TV and god forbid we call them a celebrities. Many sound uneducated (even if they are) and do not know how to coordinate their clothing in a fashionable manner when out in public. Since the show was hosted in Miami. All the Miami rappers were there and a lot of Crunk rappers from other parts of the south. Crunk rap videos usually look like something from Amos and Andy or an out take from Spike Lee’s film Bamboozled. People making all sorts of faces and doing crazy stuff and just like other genres of rap but it doesn’t stop just cause they're not making a video. They can’t turn it off. Take for instance self proclaimed Ghetto Thug rapper, Trick Daddy who was dying to show everybody his ankle bracelet that proved that he was under house arrest by the prison officials in Miami. Bonecrusher and his crew were doing the usual ignorant eyesore stuff. Lil John always looks and sounds a mess. Those two Sambo emulating southern twins who think they are funny got more exposure than they should have. Even the usually refined southern rapper named David Banner was jumping around through the audience from chair to chair like it was a mosh pit. He almost fell on his face and knocked some people over, but the nonsense came from rappers from all coast . Camron came out with that Tommy Gun and was supposed to be involved in a simulated drug deal. Nelly had his pants down sagging so low they were by his ankle. He tripped up over his pants when going on the stage to get an award - serves him right, too bad he didn't fall and crack a tooth. That would be a good example as to why you should not wear your clothes in the prison emulating fashion. They ended the show with 2 nasty strippers (although there were like 10 of them up on stage) deep French kissing each other in the middle of the screen for about 20 seconds. I know little kids saw all of this mess. All of these alleged celebrities were trying to talk on the Mic at the same time and yelling into the Mic, dying to be noticed although they were front and center on the stage. Many of them were simply trying to be more ignorant than the other. I could go on for hours but if you saw it, then you already know the negatives far outweighed the positives. You saw the people dressed like pimps in the audience were given paned shots to television viewers.

Mays and Benzino choose to show all that but edited out certain little things like the real life action like when their boy Ja-Rule was booed when he first came out. I've been to more countries than I can count on all my fingers and the 1 thing that is constant, IS that BET IS everywhere. From what I can tell, EVERYBODY in the world with a TV, gets BET. Those images are broadcast all around the world and people see that shit and think that is us, all of us. Not just Nelly and Bishop Don Juan but you and me. Many times they wonder what is really up with African Americans in the United States and they see that and think that is how we celebrate each other. They make games like Ghettopoly or ask you to dance for them at work for a free piece of watermelon. Anyway I will just retire this topic but it felt good to get of my chest .... so you can go finish dancing now - Nuff said

Released: November 17th, 2003

The views and opinions expressed herein by the author do not necessarily represent the opinions or position of Playahata.com.