An investigation into the use of violence in contemporary Rap and Grime, and why it is used.
There is often a debate, referred to as the 'effects theory,' in which media personnel suggest that particular aspects of media, that an audience is exposed to exert enough influence on them to cause them to behave in a certain way, similar to that of the behaviour expressed in the viewed text.
This argument is taken into consideration as to whether or not the violence which is commonly depicted within music videos, has a negative effect on the audience who watch them, mainly concerning those considered to be youths; ageing between 12 and 24. Whilst I personally have no firm support for either side of the argument much of the research I have discovered has given me a greater knowledge of ways in which these violent videos can have an effect on young people, but also reasons to believe that they have no effect at all and the necessity of violence, music videos sometimes possess. The ‘necessity of violence’ often comes into play when particular artist’s ego’s are at stake, or when one believes these actions are the only way in which they can ‘reach’ a particular audience. Which side of the argument is deemed to be true or ‘right’ may never be found out, but exploring this area provides a large mass of knowledge, useful for anyone to know.
Obviously different members of the public will hold varying views on this topic and I have attempted to capture as many as possible through the use of informal interviews and gaining access to previous interviews done in the past. These interviews were based solely within the London area; however interviews I’d sourced were from America. A large capacity of those who I gained my research from felt that the violent natured videos of our time have had an effect on the young people of today. One public member, aged 21, who wishes to remain anonymous stated “When you’ve got artists talking about killing this and that and these other young people look up to them, they feel that it is the way to go” Another member of similar age supported this view, suggesting that music videos containing violence should be restricted to an older audience; “if the younger kids are not watching the videos with violence it must help to cut it down” The younger generation of today seem to have an opposing view to this though. One indie artist from the grime genre aged 14 defended the use of violence within videos, saying “To be honest I think that it aint really made a difference, because everyone knows it’s just a music video...if you feel to do something you’re going to do it, that’s your decision it’s not the videos” He also shares the view which is found amongst many areas of London that are considered to be ‘hood’, this being that what’s seen in the videos is the same as what they see everyday within their community, and so it’s not the videos that influence their behaviour but rather the area in which they live in. With this being a valid point, it allows us to pose the argument that a music video does not influence someone’s behaviour, but rather the other way around; art imitates life. The idea that life can imitate art is often deemed ridiculous, as life is needed to create art in the first place. This theory of art’s imitation of life was first historically put forward by Aristotle in the context of poems and paintings, but his ideas can be applied just as well to modern forms of art or media. Through this theory we learn that art, right down to its simplest form can be considered to imitate life e.g. a shoe, as it can be seen as an imitation of the real life formation of a foot. According to this then, music videos should therefore be viewed as an imitation of real life; however an imitation of life cannot be true to someone who has not experienced that which is being imitated. The art form may be considered to become the audiences influence on real life, hence life imitating art. In context, if a violent video is aired in a remote village where peace is preached and violence is unheard of, the video is unable to be viewed as an imitation of their life (as violence does not occur), so the audience may take these unseen behaviours and form it as part of their own reality. Aristotle’s view on life imitating art can therefore be viewed as limited to particular audiences, and so it may sometimes be considered that the ways in which art may influence a person’s lifestyle is the same as the person’s life being an imitation of the art. In an interview, one 29 year old male, an amateur music video director, who wished to stay anonymous, said “I grew up in a south east London estate and what I saw on the roads was the closest I ever got to a TV...I moved out my dad’s house and I was [already] going round doing everything I see on the TV beforehand...Now I use my experiences, and my past videos, to help shape the videos you see today” This suggests that the link between art’s imitation of life can work both ways. Additionally, this producers influence on the artists he works with, ties in with Blumler and Katz theory of uses and gratification, in that the audience (his artists) seek out this particular type of media in order to gain some sort of fulfilment (potential ideas for their own music video). It is notable that the main demographic of those most willing to participate in research for this topic, or at least those most interested were those from Afro-Caribbean backgrounds, which may suggest that music is more influential on one culture than it is on others.
According to public polls [http://www.misterpoll.com/polls/77680/results] music videos with violent content are most likely to be a product of the black hip hop/rap industry. The reason behind this and the reason why it may very well be true could be due to the need for artists to maintain a particular reputation within the music industry, to their fans, and possibly to the 'streets.' Artists may purposely ignore the possibility of youths mimicking their behaviours in a video, and so do what they can in order to maintain a particular status with their target audience or fellow artist. Within the Hip Hop and Grime industries, having what may be considered a gangster or 'hood' related background is often a boost in an artist’s reputation, and as they rise to fame they may be seen to leave this life behind, eventually harming their integrity. 50cent is a self confessed example of this happening, as he admits he once considered himself a ‘Gangsta Rapper’ but now sees himself as a successful entrepreneur, however he sometimes shows his fans that his ‘hood’ side is still a part of his music. In order to gain back lost integrity, other artist’s may resort to making videos to fit how they were once viewed by the public, which is likely to incorporate the violent themes associated with a gangster or 'hood' lifestyle. A recent example of this may be in the case of one Uk Grime artist 'Ghetts' (formerly known as 'Ghetto'). Ghetto started his music career after incarceration, within which he ended up in a rap battle with another Uk Grime artist 'Bashy' who took it upon himself to accuse Ghetto of becoming a homosexual. Ghetto’s reaction was to state he 'was a bad boy in pent, ask Carlos' obviously fearing his reputation was at risk. This was streamed across YouTube, with similar videos becoming a phenomenon on the website. Further into his career Ghetts was accused again of being a homosexual, this time by another Uk Grime artist, 'P. Money'. This was soon followed by two new releases from Ghetts; ‘Trained to Kill’ [Ft. Dot Rotten], and ‘Artillery.’ From the title it is obvious to point out the nature of each of these songs, and this is backed up by the supporting videos that soon followed them. Although Ghetts claimed that each title was a metaphor for his music and lyrical ability, the videos suggested something else, particularly that of 'Trained To Kill.' The video used to accompany the audio for this song made no attempt to make a metaphor out of the song title. Within seconds the audience is presented with a blacked out figure pointing a gun towards the camera. A shot is fired and from there on we see the road to the death of the victim whilst the paramedics’ attempts to save him, fail. The video has been made as realistic as possible and there are no attempts to hide the violent nature within it. This video may be viewed in two ways though, in terms of how the target audience may interpret the message put across by the artist. The first interpretation, and the one I see to make the most sense, is that this video is not a celebration, an encouragement of, or a promotion of violence, but rather that it is the complete opposite to this. Within this video the use of the gun, and the after effects of it are not glamorised in any way, but instead we are presented with the harsh realities of gun violence. The use of a young male as the victim in the video may have been a way to ensure this occurs, as it allows those of the target audience to directly relate to those within the video, giving them the idea that this same thing can occur to them. The second reading of this is that the use of a gun by a person who we can't identify, and the fact that this person is never seen being caught within the video, will give the targeted audience the idea that the use of guns is not so bad if it is done in similar conditions. These two readings of the video may have been created purposefully by the video director, as the promotion of violence may be subtle enough to fit into the regulations of music videos today, whilst also being strong enough to help maintain ‘Ghetts’’ reputation of being from the hood. This may be seen as an extremely subtle promotion of violence, if anything, when directly compared to the video made for the song 'Many Men (Wish Death)' by American rap artist 50Cent. From the opening credits the use of violence is apparent with the SFX of gunshots, and this violent nature tends to carry on throughout the music video. The way in which violence is presented to the audience is very different to how it is given in Ghetts' video 'Trained To Kill.' 50Cent's way of showing violence is both direct and indirect; sometimes we see the violence occurring and sometimes we see the before and after, and are left to assume what happens in between. The audience is also given the view of a crime scene investigation team, with them seemingly being unable to solve the murders. As with Ghetts' video, it denotes that killers will not be caught, and this may be seen as putting the wrong message across to youths. Direct comparisons may be drawn from these videos and actual crime drama’s on TV in that the violence is often shown to the audience in the same way, and so surely they would be influenced in the same way as these videos, but more often than not the ‘bad guy’ is always brought to justice in these shows, therefore showing the negative side of violence in the end. Another way in which these two videos differ is the time in which they were created, 'Many Men'[2003] and 'Trained To Kill'[2010]. The differences in the level of violence in each video may be representative of the time in which they were created and the views of Hip Hop/Rap/Grime at those times. It appears that over the course of the last seven years or so, the use of violence has become more limited, not by choice of artists and/or video producers, but by the public and media condemning the violent side to these genres of music. Another example of this although it may not be considered a Hip Hop/Rap/Grime song or video in itself, is “Born Free” by UK artist M.I.A. The red-headed boy playing the victim of anti-redhead American soldiers has come to its defence. "[M.I.A.] was cool on set and it was a great chance to tell everyone that bully's [sic] suck...There are countries killing their own people...I am proud to be a part of M.I.A.'s shout out to the world."
M.I.A.'s 'Born Free'[2010] video and Prodigy's 'Smack My Bitch Up'[1997] video are prime examples of how attitudes towards what should and shouldn't been shown to the public through mainstream media changes. Whilst ‘Smack My Bitch Up' has been debated as to whether or not it should be aired on TV, it has survived attempts to ban it, although censorship of images of nudity have been put in place. M.I.A.'s 'Born Free' however has been banned from the YouTube website and mainstream television too. It may be assumed that had M.I.A.'s video been produced back in 1997, the year in which 'Smack My Bitch Up' was released; it would have survived attempts to ban its, however we must consider the differences in the violence and abuse which is depicted in each video. ‘Smack My Bitch Up’[1997] seems to lure the audience into the idea that the character is subjecting themselves to self abuse through excessive drinking, drug use and sexual interactions. This contrasts with what the audience is exposed to in ‘Born Free’[2010] which expresses violence of a political nature, and so it may be seen to cause more controversy. Although the shooting of the young boy at point blank range seems to be the image that has caused such uproar about the video, it may be useful to take into account that institutions directly linked with the government could see this as a threat to them. The video is considered an outburst against governments and the way of doing business, and so the banning of it from popular social networking sites such as YouTube could be a direct action done to protect the ideologies of large institutions and corporations.
Bibliography
Merlin9988,2010,Prodigy - Smack my bitch up(Full Official video). [Video Online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BpfydZdTE0> [Accessed 19th October 2010]
M.I.A. - Born Free. News Article
asoe209,2007,Ghetto vs. Bashy part 3. [Video Online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTcavT-li6Y> [Accessed 13th January 2011]
GrimeDaily,2010,P MONEY "THE DUB' RESPONSE TO GHETTO.[Video Online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORcxL-Ln-ao> [Accessed 19th October 2010]
360records09,2010,GHETTS FT DOT ROTTEN - TRAINED TO KILL (OFFICIAL HOOD VIDEO - HD). [Video Online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8cqSJimcXE&feature=bf_prev&list=PL9EAC818E2A22B7D2&index=1> [Accessed 19th October 2010]
360records09,2010,Ghetts - Artillery (OFFICIAL VIDEO - HD). [Video Online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCKCHKRswQs> [Accessed 19th October 2010]
50CentVEVO,2009,50 Cent -
Many Men (Wish Death) (Dirty Version).[Video Online] Available at: <
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