1st actual written post of the new year, it should be crack right?
Thing about crack is......despite it's modern day usage as a slang term for anything "dope," generally pleasing or highly addictive, it pretty much still means "crack"...you know....the drug that destroyed communities , had mothers selling their childrens' playstation 2's and sucking di*k for twenty dollar rocks. Crack destroyed communities! Crack made the Colombian cocaine cartels rich off the intensive street labor of the impoverished urban youth whom exterminated each other at will, continuing a cycle of genocide which only aided in killing off our people before they were smart enough to realize that "hey...I'm kiling my own community just to make another nig*a rich." I'll say it again. Crack caused many a dream deffered to dry up and wither like a raisin in the sun, and many a chickenhead to respond to the not so faithful mating call of yerpppp or aiyyyyo...the modern manifestation of why the caged, excuse me..."jail" bird sings. Crack destroyed black people...but it didn't destroy as many as Michael Jordan Sneakers.
Tako: Yo had a smidget of a point there, but for the most part you're just being silly.
-Bros
Lets start with the similarities.
Both born in the early 1980's....imported from non-english speaking countries by white men, yet made popular by the minority salesman who shone like lighthouses of swag amidst a sea of urban blight.
Tako: I'm L.O.L-ing at "Lighthouses of swag." Somebody give this nig*a tenure. I'd much rather listen to him than C4's "Uncle" Michael Eric Dyson.
Wja3: Son, you just said L.O.L-ing. Hood pass revoked.
As you can see, the similarities are profound. What makes a pair of Mike's , J's, Jordans or whatever you choose to call them much MORE harmful than the proverbial knob slobbage of the porcelin-glass penis, however, is that it is fundamentally different from crack in 3 ways.
1.) Jordans cause more black on black crime. Crackheads don't fight crackheads....but I bet you a fool will smoke you for your Jordans. Unlike crack, which actually encourages people to come together (they huddle for warmth, sleep in communal abandoned apartments and struggle through the daily perils of addiction together), Jordans perpetuate the selfish hood mentality of buying J's before pampers and culture of flaunting transitory wealth in front of the impoverished masses. Sure I could help my mother with the bills, or give the hungry little kid downstairs a few dollars for a beef patty since his mom is strung out on heroin, but nahhhhh "the new Jordan's finna come out" (Project Pat Voice). Think a crackhead would be that selfish? Hell naw. They could rob a liquor store and on the way home run into 4 hungry hungry hookers sellin J-lo booty for half price and you think they'd spend a dime? Nope. That's communal crack money. There may not be honor amongst thieves...but I'd trust a crackhead with 200 dollars to buy rock before I trust a sneakerhead with my new J's. LOL
Tako: Yo had a smidget of a point there, but for the most part you're just being silly.
2.) There's no stigma attached to being addicted to kicks. A crackhead, however is the worst possible thing you could be called. Nigg*r...nahhhhh, we added an "a" to that and use it more than we use proper grammar. Bit*h? Please....our women use that word more than we do. Broke? Sheeeeeit....call me broke, we all are. But Crackhead....? You called me a crackhead? On my momma's thems is fightin words.
Being a crackhead is like the inverse Cinderella story whereupon she slips off the glass slipper and falls on the glass pipe, later to be found by a pimp named prince charming. We all know how the book ends. Skinny, homeless and jittery with messed up teeth is your fate ma.
Being a sneakerhead, however, is like being the star of the rags to riches story. You buy all the kicks you missed out on as an impoverished youth only to realize that the "I'm grown, I should be able to buy nice things" argument only works when you aren't drowning in debt. Much more dangerous than the ugly allure of the crack whore, the Jordan life is glamorous...its like a pretty girl with the HIV...you dont know it's got ya until its too late...unless you're Magic Johnson. Sheeeeit, he beat AIDS....that nig*a would destroy crack!!
3. People have concrete knowledge of the effects of crack. Like I said before, we ALL know how the story ends and most of us even have an aunt "felicia" or cousin "Pookie." If you didnt get that Friday and New Jack City reference go read a vogue magazine and go about your merry way onto mayberry. The effects of Jordans, however, are not so blatantly obvious as their imminent danger involves a complex discussion on creditworthiness, debt and liquidity. Also, add the idea of appreciation vs. Depreciation into that sentence.
You buy Jordans at 18 cause you saved all your summer youth at work checks to meet the status quo...not to be fly, but to meet the status quo, cause everybody else is doing the same thing. Chalk it up to being young, dumb and full of.....well, you get it.
You buy Jordans at 21 because you have a full time job and can now afford fly sneakers as you are earning a substantial income without yet having the riptide of student loan debt, or cell phone debt collectors who've finally realized you've broken like 6 contracts come crashingdown atop your weary little head.
You buy AIR Jordans at 25 because they bring back nostalgia of your "youth." Also, it looks ridiculous for a grown man to be wearing sneakers unless they're crispy and somewhat expensive....either that or they have to been "Old head Adidas shell toes." Nobody wants to be the old man in team Jordans and a track suit, or with his T-shirt tucked into his Paco jeans...this is a precursor to stacy Adams shoes and a Kangol aka proof that your youthful days are over and you might as well start wearing those plaid shirts that come with the matching hat.
In all three of those scenarios notice the one thing absent. Cost. Nowhere in those internal mental discourses does said individual consider the monetary cost of such transitory luxury items. The phrase "You only live once"....yeah, black folks created that to justify buying shit we didnt really need on credit. While yes, I do believe that saving for a rainy day when you live in the Sahara is lame because no amount of money can buy back your youthful years, I will say that "ni**a we don't live in the Sahara....we live in the projects...and not only is a rainy day possible, its also guaranteed as we are living under a perpetual storm cloud of debt, poverty and institutional racism." (I quote myself when I say dope shit.) Fu*k all that though. Destroy my credit score, foreclose my house, garnish my wages, boot my car, send my kids to DCF, raid my stash house but DON'T...I repeat, DON'T TAKE MY J's.
People blame Nike for selling 30 cent shoes at a 220.00 price-tag but we should really blame ourselves. I dont see Nike offering lines of credit, which means they're already not as bad as the Wal-mart you all love and praise. Nike has to market its product and get you to believe that it's the greatest thing since birth control...this takes money. The problem isnt the message Nike gave us, but rather our interpretation. In a society so focused on the almighty dollar we've become so entrenched in appearances that we spend all our money, to the point of being broke, just so we can appear "richer" than the other broke people doing the same. We used to want to be like mike. Now we just want to be like the Drug dealer because other than Michael himself...he's the only person we know who can afford the mikes. Our parents tell us don't deal drugs and we oblige because we dont want to end up excleuded from jobs and buttfu*ked in jail....so how do we get the Mikes? Credit cards. And that's where things fell apart.
-Bros
This is the first result in google image search for "WJA3."
Ghetto heaven, anyone?
And to think most people have to work for a living. Suckers.
Got yo money, nigga. What you gon' do?
