Believe Half Of What You Hear and None Of What You See?

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These guys have killed millions. Of people. A lot.

I realized something a few days ago. And I’m not quite sure how to say this so I might as well just say it straight up.

I like being lied to.

Yes, apparently as a fan of mainstream hip-hop, I appreciate being lied to by some of my favorite artists.

Notice I said, MAINSTREAM rap. For all of you boho’s out there who will think this is an indictment on ALL rap, please read the preceeding sentence again. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

*humming Eminem’s “I’ll Kill You”*

N.W.A. lied to me constantly, Mobb Deep lied to me.

T.I. lies to me. Rick Ross lies to me. Lil Wayne lies to anybody who will listen. Common is lying to us all now. Well you get the point. These ninjas are all lying because they continue to write all of these tales of their current street acumen and all of the weapons they travel with and the drugs they currently slang, etc.

And I am a fan.

Now granted, I don’t actually believe any of these dudes do half of the sh*t they claim to do. I don’t believe that Rick Ross is moving that much snow in the hood or that T.I. is still moving blow in the hood. I don’t believe that any of these dudes have murdered anybody, with the possible exception of 50 Cent and that’s strictly due to one line on his song “Problem Child” from like 2003:

“they say you can never repay the price for taking a man’s life/I’m in debt with Christ cuz I done did that twice” – 50 Cent

I’ll admit, I do question the veracity of that statement and maybe it just sounds good in rhyme. But, errrum, most rappers tell you that they WILL kill you, as in future tense. 50 says that he HAS done it. Somehow, that makes me a little nervous. Luckily he isn’t in any jeopardy of going to Heaven anyway as I do in fact believe his posters are plastered through the Great Hall of Hades as one of the biggest proponents of Hell.

But for the most part, I don’t believe most of these rappers. And I’m not saying that none of these dudes sold drugs. I’m sure that T.I. did as I’m sure that Jay-Z did. I’m sure 50 Cent did as well as a slew of other rappers. Of course, there are lots of questions about how big these “drug dealers” were as even Biggie’s own people have said that he wasn’t nearly the drug dealer he claimed to be. Many of these dudes do indeed have the soul of hustlers so I believe that many of them have done SOME of the things they claim in rhyme. Let’s just say that amongst the lies they share resides some segment of truth.

But between all of the murders these rappers claim to be willing to commit and all of the weight that they claim to be moving and the fact that I don’t actually believe any of them are as big time as they claim, it just seems that I like being lied to. I mean, I buy into it as it relates to their persona on wax. And somehow, they seem to buy into their own stories enough to convince me to buy into them. And I’m not alone. For some strange reason, as far as our mainstream rappers go, with the possible exception of Kanye West, we all like to hear about how hard these dudes are and we can easily look past the fact that their entire catalog is filled with odes to drug slanging and killin’ ninjas on the block.

Now for the life of me, I can’t figure out why I’ll let this type of sh*t slide. The lies, I mean. Most normal people detest liars. People that will lie to you are the very people you’d not want to be around. Yet in mainstream rap, being able to convince people of your street respectability, be it fabricated or not, is paramount. If somebody found out that Kenny Rogers had never played a game of poker, well, how upset would the country music world be? Or what if the Dixie Chicks were from Canada? Or what if Guns ‘N Roses didn’t live the life they sang about? Of course, that’s an impossibility because if you’ve seen the vh1 Behind The Music on the Guns, you’d realize, them white boys and Slash were nuckin’ futs.

I guess this all ties into the very notion that even as an educated black man, respect and pride are very important. I live in a black neighborhood and you don’t want anybody to even think about wanting to mess with you. Somehow, these are the problems we concern ourselves with. So I sometimes walk around with this air of “don’t f*ck with me or this might be a bad day for you”. We all know I’m as gangsta as they come, but we also all know that I purchased a Hillary Duff CD. The key is to not let anybody else know it. And I think this is a problem that is unique to the black man experience. I could be wrong, but it seems to me that we spend a lot of time trying to scare the bejesus out of white and black people. Hell, we don’t have anything else…all we have is our respect.

Or so we say.

And maybe that’s why we like to be lied to so much. We spend so much time trying to be the dude that everybody wouldn’t want to mess with, kind of as a manifestation of our idea of self-preservation, that despite the sheer impossibility of many of these rappers claims, we see them as a lot like us, even if we may come from totally different circumstances. Right?

I remember during the last episode of Season 3 of The Wire, after Stringer Bell, had been gangstaliciously murdered by Omar and Brother Mouzone, Detective McNulty was in Stringer’s apartment looking through his books and possessions and couldn’t believe the types of books String had been reading. It was so astounding to him he wondered aloud who in the hell was he chasing?

I wonder if a lot of these dudes are indeed like that. They all seem to look up to Tupac and we know the intelligent hoodlum he was. I know a lot of people don’t like Tupac as a rapper, and I have my days as well, but as a person he was the epitome of the young black man so many of us wish to be. Educated but respected by all. He had the pedigree, he had the struggle, he had the ability to rise above it, and he went out in a blaze of glory. Actually, nix that last part, I’d rather go out while drinking some Kool-Aid when I’m 98.

All in all, I wonder if the reason we love being lied to so much is because so many of us spend time lying to ourselves about who we really are. From white suburban “thugs” to some of the inner-city black “thugs”. Yeah the white boys get to grow out of it, but so many of us black men still fall victim to the idea that we have to be able to be respected in the streets, at age 30.

So yes, I like being lied too. Hell, I enjoy it thoroughly. And I think I don’t pay much attention to it because in some kind of weird way, I understand.

Besides, if I want honesty, I’ll just listen to Milli Vanilli.

So what about you? Do you like being lied to as well or do you even pay attention anymore?

-VSB P aka THE ARSONIST aka MR. GIVE ME A REASON TO LOVE YOU BACK aka GIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRL HE A 3

324 thoughts on “Believe Half Of What You Hear and None Of What You See?”

  1. I’ve stopped evenlistening to most of that mess. The lies are so rampant, so many, by so many, and so many telling the same lie…who can keep up? Who can care?

    I just like the beats anyway :)

    I think about the only folks that don’t lie are R&B singers (w.the exception of mr Baby “I’ll pay your rent” Face…i think he lied about that
    KMN

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    • To some degree I can kind of appreciate this sort of method acting type approach to pop music. It’s the implied realistic violence and crime that makes it a bit mer disturbing than say, I dunno, Alice Cooper’s act.

      The gangsta act has become very repetitive, but maintains its appeal…kind of like how Elvis impersonators are still making money doing the same act over and over.

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      • Method acting! LOL too bad it doesn’t pay off in their reality series. Terrible acting. Kids justa cheesin’ when it’s time for them to talk on camera.

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        • Hey. Eddie Ruffin and The Temptations sung about their undying love for women whom they were monogamous to. In reality, they some cheating mofos who ran ip in every mo-city project chick.

          Same thing with Luther Vandross playing the,role of a straight man singing ballads to his woman. O_o

          It is entertainment.

          Most in the music biz lie in theit songs. It is just easier to criticize ratchet niggas for it, right?

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            • interesting point tho. cats sing what they think the public wants to hear. then life imitates art, which is actually not a good thing when art illustrates dysfunction. wouldn’t it be nice if people just sang truth and simply collected the fans who could relate to them? novel idea.

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          • ” Hey. Eddie Ruffin and The Temptations sung about their undying love for women whom they were monogamous to. In reality, they some cheating mofos who ran ip in every mo-city project chick.”

            Thanks for this one. I mean, I guess people could say that they were aspiring to something “positive”, and just came up short, but I think they were just tellin ppl what they wanna hear just like rappers do. You know what they say, female h*es sell sex, male h*es sell dreams lol

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    • R&B singers lie for a living too, it’s just for sheet respect not street respect. Think “Just Gotta Make It” Trey Songz to “Neighbors Know My Name” Trey Songz. This brotha changed his whole image for success, it was like the record label said “we could really make some money if Trey cut his hair, gained 20lbs in muscle, and only sang about sex.”

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      • I belive any rapper in the early 90s and before. After ’96 it became a gimmick. Although there was a resurgence of plausible veracity when eminem and 50 cent came out. The only reason I bought Dr. Dre chronicle 2000 was becuz by that time I was old enough to buy a cd (edited version from Target!).

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      • Wait – that bird looks like that AFTER gaining 20lbs of muscle?? WOW, was he emaciated before?? DAYUM, he needs to eat more steak, like, errryday for all the shirtless time he puts the masses through!

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        • ” Wait – that bird looks like that AFTER gaining 20lbs of muscle?? WOW, was he emaciated before?? DAYUM, he needs to eat more steak, like, errryday for all the shirtless time he puts the masses through!”

          lmao! Ikr, you beat me to that comment. He really doesn’t know he got a bird chest though. Swear that lil ninja make me look swole, and that’s sayin somethin lol

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    • im with everybody else. R&B singers are probably bigger liars than rappers. do you really think K-Ci would cry for any woman. i don’t.

      in fact old soul r&b singers are probably the biggest liars of them all.

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  4. I only believe the Clipse. I liked intricately weaved tales so I don’t mind being lied to in music. I mean I still listen to Lupe even though he pretends to be an intellectual.

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    • You only believe the Clipse? Huh? Not only are they like the least believable of all rappers, but they’ve even admitted that there stuff is all just entertainment and they aint bout that life. That one threw me off. Now if you’re asking who I believe I’ll throw out names like B.G. Lil Boosie (check his rap sheet, I know ppl in the criminal justice system in Baton Rouge) Trick Daddy (I know ppl that know him) and Juvenile (you can’t fake authenticity to that degree, not in that city). Can’t believe he said Clipse lol

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      • How could I forget to add the late great Pimp C to that list of the few I actually believe. That ninja may have been exaggerating a lil, but he wasn’t pullin fairy tales completely out of his arse (I’m lookin at you Lil Wayne)

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        • I agree on the list of BG, Trick, Juve, Pimp. They are none to act out in public. BG’s song about being addicted to Heroin is one of my favorites. “I be thinkin’ ” is one of the realest songs ever, any genre.

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            • @Eric MD- Yeah man, I was just bout to mention that. You don’t get addicted to heroin when you’re a studio gangsta. That’s a fa real hard times drug. Cocaine is the hollywood drug. And let’s not forget how his boy Turk is still locked up for shootin at the police…I pray for ppl that came up in those type of situations

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            • OMG how the h*ll could I forget Scarface! Your favorite rapper’s favorite rapper. His raps actually made kids NOT wanna be a thug/drug dealer. He always talked about the effed up depressing dark side of the game that none of these commercial rappers with their gangsta personas ever bring up. One of the best artists to graze a mic imo

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              • Man, Face is still the truth. Honestly, i think you can tell a studio hustler from a real one. You think about Jay and Scarface who actually were in the game, they talked about the most authentic part–what hustlers THINK ABOUT. What goes on in your head when you about to make a deal, or ducking police, or when you think your boy is tryin to pull a coup. You can’t fake those feelings. You right bruh. I DEFINITELY didn’t wanna sell drugs or get shot at after that.

                But we turn around and roast the sh!t out of Drake for speaking his feelings.

                Us humans is some self-destructive mofos.

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      • here’s an interesting thing about The Clipse (though I dont really believe them either)…the reason they originally came out talking that they were fabricating stuff is that their manager was implicated in a big coke bust that netted due like 35 years in prison. it was in their best interest to be like…yeah, we stay lying on wax. in fact, ive never seen cocaine before. ever. not one day of my life.

        i think that “admission” may have been a stretch of the truth and was a business decision to avoid potential implication in what looked like jail time.

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  5. This is very introspective.

    From now on, whenever I hear black men ponder why black women put up nearly indestructible walls to mask our vulnerability, I will give them a link to this article. We all do it, just differently.

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  6. I only hate being lied to when suspect azz rappers and singers claim to love hot apple pie when they really want a sausage sandwich. Now, I’m sure it would be diffucult for an openly gay rapper or singer to keep his audience but don’t lie to me bro……Let me decide. *I’m lookin at u Neyo AND Trey Songz*

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    • hot apple pie ? *lmao*

      *Why did I think of that McDonalds applie pie reading your words before I realized you were talking genitalia?*

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    • lmao @ Tx- Yeah, R&B ninjas are somethin else. Also they (meaning rappers AND R&B ninjas) need more ppl with all this talk about their sexual prowess. I mean ALL yal ninjas can’t be puttin it down like Lex Steele. I know no woman wants to hear you croon about being mediocre most times in the bedroom, but there’s ways to keep it real without killin women’s fantasies…then again maybe not if that’s what most of your success is based off of (the idea that you’re a beast between the sheets)…so I take that back exaggerate away lol

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      • I don’t happen to think Trey Songz is gay, I just think his music is garbage. Ne-yo is CLEARLY gay. Everything about him gives it away. However gay he may be (very), I like his music.

        I like all the songs about love, sex and everything in-between. Why? Because they are idealized. We all want everlasting love with someone who is skilled in every way, including sexually. While I’m smart enough to know that I can’t have everything, I can certainly have the music to fill in the gaps :D

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        • Now see…I’m different. Really like Trey’s music. Just wish EVERY damn song wasn’t bout sex. He just be doin way too much, and from what I constantly hear online….w/Trannies too. lol

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        • ” I don’t happen to think Trey Songz is gay, I just think his music is garbage.”

          Co effin sign. I just don’t get it. I guess ppl are that starved for a new age R&B star (since Usher just doesn’t do it for ppl like he used to). I like a few of his club bangers but when he actually tries to sing he fails miserably imo. I like this Mo-VSS chick. We see eye to eye on a lot of things…I see u Mo lol

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      • The more I think about it I guess I like being lied to as well cause I love hearing all these ninjas speak on what they can do. I like that they aspire to be the best that ever did it at chex shout out to Plies (drops head in shame) Weezy,T.I.P., Trey, Fat Joe & Chris Brown ….I want the both of u to make me want another round please and thank you Lol

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    • Kandy tried to make that happen with that guy on RHOA (Lawrence?) Remember “Closet Freak?” Not sure where that went; he did have a good voice.

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    • at least that’s speculation. when these jackbusters still talkin’ about totin’ (okay, maybe TI wasn’t lying) and staying on the G4 etc…

      shut up. you aint gots to lie craiiiiiiiiiig.

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  7. I’ve stopped giving a damn some time ago; just get me drunk enough & anything will sound hot to me *lol*. But seriously, I don’t really care whether someone actually pushed all that dope they claimed they did, or chexed half the world (only person I believe on that front is Lil’ Wayne) cause it ain’t me tellin’ them lies to sell records, so it don’t concern me.

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    • I believe lil wayne as well I mean all them seeds back to back like months apart. I also believe T.I.P. and his chex tales I like that little guy

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      • Im wit u on T.I.P. and his chex tales. The women looooove that guy even before he blew up all the girls down here in GA was swoonin before I even knew what that word meant lol. But I gotta shut down that Lil Wayne thing. All the other Cash Money (original Cash Money none of this Drake and Currensy ish) said he wasn’t bout that life. Perhaps he dabbled a tad, but they all called him out and I just don’t believe him. He was in the house watchin tv. How else you think he got all them pop culture references to tie his puns to? lol, plus that ninja brags about gettin shot, but unless you dig deeper you wouldn’t realize that he shot himself by accident #thugfantasyfail lol

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        • LMBO from this point on thank you Sir…

          “How else you think he got all them pop culture references to tie his puns to? lol, plus that ninja brags about gettin shot, but unless you dig deeper you wouldn’t realize that he shot himself by accident #thugfantasyfail lol”

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