Social Comm. Series Pt. 1: Stop Snitchin?
As part of this blog I will be opening up a series called Social Commentary. Hopefully this series will help shed light on issues that either plague or cripple our society or different societies. Up first...The Issue of the Snitch...Stop Snitchin. Throughout the years and various hoods around the country, the theme of "Stop Snitchin'" has become very commonplace. If you've been in any mall, within the last 6 years, you've probably seen shirts with the "Stop Snitchin'" phrase worn by adults and youth of all races. The phrase itself has transformed our society into a society of silence. A society that works with the notion of "even if you see it...you better not tell."Now at the root of this is fear. This impending fear manifests itself into three phases: Fear of retaliation, fear of loss of life, and fear of being a social outcast, with the latter being the least important of the three. Fear of retaliation is real because social circles run very close in the most hoods'. One may put themselves at risk if they are seen talking to police or have word spread that they are the ones who gave the information to police, which may lead to an arrest. Let's shift to the flip-side of this which includes the victim and suspect. The "tell them" element is held close because the "vengeance is mine" mentality is at work. If someone really wants to get the suspect who committed a crime and they don't want the police to just arrest,charge, and jail the suspect, then lips stay tight and hood justice works it's way out.
In the case of the social outcast they become heavily devalued to their society. Unfortunately that's just the way it is.
This is now speaking to the un-involvement of society. Too many times have incidents happen where people have been murdered, raped, molested, kidnapped, and robbed and no one offers any information. What's deeper than this is the fact that people will now watch someone get beat to death in a robbery or something else and do absolutely nothing. The value is now on "how much am I worth...how much are you worth." A view which says I'm now losing today even if it means you lose. Wow.
I came across this video including Anderson Cooper from CNN and Cam'ron from the Dipset, on 60 Minutes, speaking truthfully on the subject. Cam was honest about him truly caring about his sales. Whether I agree or not is another story, but the spoke from his...uhh..heart. But when it comes to if a serial killer is living next to me...I don't know if the snitchin' rules apply. You watch and judge for yourself.
