Why is BB re-posting Daily News stories that have no facts beyond the press release for the charge and Shocked Neighbor ReactionsTM?
Any other outlet posting this and I’d assume it was because he’s black and related to someone famous. But I’m used to higher motives from Xeni, and I literally do not believe she would post click-bait.
I’m not so much disappointed as baffled. The Xeni Jardin I’ve been following for over a decade is a journalist, not a tabloid re-poster.
And the comments! Have you tried reading them? Like third-graters!
Agreed…the content is okay, but the spelling is shit.
Abuse of power / trust by the rich and powerful.
Call them out, wherever, whenever.
Is Nicki Minaj’s brother rich and powerful?
No idea. But connected. Could easily use that influence to sway a youngster.
If you’re at all knowledgeable of pop culture in 2015, yes, you should know who Nicki Minaj is.
I see it as tying into the new video culture with regard to police brutality: I can’t remember which poster said it (I think @Mindysan33), but basically the “comfortable people” are now finally learning what the victims have always known, thanks to incontrovertible proof in the form of live video recordings.
Famous, powerful men have been raping young girls and women since proto-humans crawled out of the ooze. Now it’s starting to not be OK anymore.
That’s certainly a reading of it. And I dont think I have seen this number of complaints when it has been more obviously the case that power and corruption was a major factor. I frankly cannot tell how much of a factor it was in the current case, but say, in cases where the/a church has been hushing up abuse, I don’t think anyone said “tabloid”.
If this is indeed why this story is on Boingboing, it might have helped to explain it clearer, point out the underlying power structure, etc.
Is the 2015 pop culture worth the time to get familiar with?
It’s something I saw that Ta-Nehisi Coates has said recently about lynching of young black men and women, but having grown up in a small town in the south, I knew also to be true. Those racial lines were still reinforced in a number of ways, though not as stringently, where I grew up.
But yeah, the more light we shed on issues like gendered and racial violence, the more likely we are to sway popular opinion to the right side of history. Much like the American/French/Haitain revolutions opened up a set of possibilities that didn’t exist before in challenging the advent of capitalism in unexpected ways, the expansion of the ability of the state/corporations to constantly watch us has some unintended consequences, which includes the ability to share violations of our lives and bodies.
???
Whether her music is the sort of thing you dig or not, I don’t think cultural ignorance is something to aspire to.
Keeping track of all the changes in pop culture is a fulltime job. This comes with opportunity cost - all the better things that can be done with that time.
You’d be right in the world with infinite time available.
Edit: What yields more fun and usefulness - a hour spent tracking down who some pop singer wonder-of-the-week is, or a hour spent reading about the composition and effects of different MMA welding electrode claddings? See, the choice is clear.
It’s Minaj’s brother. There’s no traditional power linkage between a celebrity and their sibling that way unless the sibling has become a celebrity as well (which might come through the connections of the famous sibling.) The reality is that there a gazillion examples of celebrities with “embarrassing” family members who don’t seem to get special treatment. Whether it’s Gordon Ramsay’s brother, who is an addict that’s been in an out of institutions, Mindy Kaling’s brother who pretended to be black to get into med school, or countless examples you’ve never even heard of.
There is literally no evidence that Minaj’s celebrity status or money protected anyone here. If that comes to light, then it’s a story. Otherwise, it may as well be “Nassau Man Charged with etc.”
“Like Satan reads the bible” as the saying goes in these parts. I say that it isn’t disproved, nor impossible, that Nickis influence was a factor in this, but that there is little to support it. And here you respond like I claimed it was an incontrovertible fact.
Is this even a conversation? Are you replying to the right person?
(Totally off topic–there is a thread where people are writing down old sayings and colloquialisms, and I think that would make a great addition)
I’m 44 and don’t really care about “this year’s thing” in pop music. Next year, it will be something else. Celebrity is boring and talent outshines a given year.
Bowie has a new album in a month though.
Huh, did not know that. Thanks!!
