Opinion
Stop Snitchin’ won’t stop crime
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Also by Robert Phansalkar:
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In light of a recent study that revealed the painfully obvious truth of racial profiling in law enforcement, the "Stop Snitchin'" movement is getting some well-deserved heat from CBS' "60 Minutes" correspondent Anderson Cooper.
Cooper, who also hosts CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360," highlighted the Stop Snitchin' movement, which gained mainstream notoriety in the wake of NBA superstar Carmelo Anthony's support of the movement a little more than a year ago.
Stop Snitchin' has its roots in a Boston-based rapper who goes by either T.A.N.G.G. or Tangg the Juice. His alias literally means "Tellin' Ass Niggas Gotta Go." T.A.N.G.G. wants to tell people about where he came from and why it is important for those from the 'hood to stay together — and by that he means not help the police.
The movement is predicated upon the assumption that police, being more likely to search and arrest minorities, are perpetuating institutions of racism in urban locales. The movement implicitly maintains that until the system reflects the kind of justice they would like to see, minorities should willfully avoid helping police with ongoing investigations, regardless of circumstance or crime.
One might expect that T.A.N.G.G. and other rappers in favor of the movement are just thugs who do not want to get caught committing crimes, but in actuality, T.A.N.G.G. has lost many of his friends to gang violence, according to the Stop Snitchin' website.
While the movement has developed into something of an asset for a rapper's record sales and perceived "street cred," the movement has also blossomed into an unfortunate force with which police have to address.
But as Cooper pointed out, how far does this ethic go? Cameron Giles, also known as Cam'ron or Killa Cam, was shot multiple times in his Lamborghini during an attempted carjacking, but refused to give police any information about the suspects. Certainly, avoiding police encourages the very kind of lawlessness that is all too common in cities riddled with gang violence. Although T.A.N.G.G. and his cohorts at the Stop Snitchin' website have universally experienced and complained about rough neighborhoods and this very kind of lawlessness, the irony of their position is something they simply haven't realized.
When complaining about the state of affairs in your local neighborhood — which undoubtedly is affected and influenced by the glaring absence of law — it is difficult to connect how refusing to contribute to investigations helps the dilemma.
Even if the Stop Snitchin' movement isn't aiming to lower crime rates, not cooperating with police certainly does not help the situations that these rappers grew up in, which makes their support of the movement all the more confusing.
If someone actually wants to change the situation in the neighborhood to reduce gang violence and have a shot at breaking boundaries and moving beyond poverty, familiarizing yourself with the institutions that generate successful and peaceful neighborhoods seems like an appropriate path to consider.
However, for most of the rappers and other supporters of this movement, the belief is that these systems are predicated upon racism and other forms of bigotry and that when cooperated with they actual hinder your autonomy and threaten to put you in the position of real criminals: behind bars.
Certainly, racism dominating law enforcement is a legitimate issue that needs to be addressed, but simply not cooperating with the institutions that exist to protect you, your family and everybody else is a ludicrous solution.
Turning your back on the system ensures one thing: The system will continue to not work for you. Expecting change to happen when you look away is precisely the kind of mentality that rarely accomplishes anything and draws more heat than if you were just working positively to affect your community.
Instead of rapping about not snitchin' on real criminals, if the conditions are as deplorable as suggested, why not rap about not committing crimes? Why not rap about improving the systems of inequality through positive action? Why not do anything except for the movement that these rappers are participating in?
The reality is all of these questions are left unanswered with Stop Snitchin', and even though the movement defies the logic of self-preservation, it will continue in the meantime because nobody has the gall to stand up and say what really happened.
Robert Phansalkar (rphansalkar@badgerherald.com) is a senior majoring in languages and cultures of Asia and political science.
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IP hash: 494b4d90
So true
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Isn’t most crime by blacks committed against blacks? But evan that is the white man’s fault?
IP hash: 44c3782b
Don’t you realize the only respectable way to make a living if you are from the hood is by playing professinal sports, rapping, or selling drugs? Everything else is for those who want to be enslaved by the white man.
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Robert, it’s not racism that’s getting minorities pulled over. Dude, you just have to stop acting paranoid when you’re transporting drugs across town. Don’t freak out when a cop pulls up beside you at the stoplight. If he senses any sudden nervousness in you, he’s gonna think you’re up to something. White people learned that a long time ago.
IP hash: fb5aa878
The people who believe in stop snitchin also subscribe to the theory of every man for himself. Its a disdain for the police in all aspects.
IP hash: 04ad0ee0
In many institutions and organizations, snitching will get you ostracized. These include higher order institutions like elite private schools. Snitching is considered a selfish, anti-social behavior. If you find somebody’s fault, you are expected to address that person directly, and that person is expected to confess.
But in public schools, snitching is encouraged and rewarded. There is no sense of community. You are expected to grab what you can for yourself. The public schools are meant to be this way. It produces very predictable, fearful, obedient pupils for the workforce.
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“that person is expected to confess.”
Good luck with that - I’m sure the killers, rapists and car-jackers will be lining up to confess.
All you need to do is rap about how cool it is to confess. I’m sure they’ll see how wonderful it is to do their time for their crime!
IP hash: c5731e98
“Dude, you just have to stop acting paranoid when you’re transporting drugs across town. Don’t freak out when a cop pulls up beside you at the stoplight. If he senses any sudden nervousness in you, he’s gonna think you’re up to something. White people learned that a long time ago.”
Obviously you’ve never lived in the South. Being black is enough cause for cops to pull you over. Legacies also contribute to this, since blacks have only been “equal” for 40 years now.
IP hash: 04ad0ee0
3:13pm The public schools turn kids into hedonistic, selfish automatons who go out and commit crimes because they’ve been taught, indirectly, that it’s OK as long as they don’t get caught. The system is cyclical.
Give kids the respect, dignity, and personal time to grow up, instead of wasting their time with pointless busywork.
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To the guy who says “Snitching produces fearful…, obedient people for the workforce.” You, my friend, are an idiot.
I’d say you have to define what snitching is first off. If snitching is describing your would be car jackers to the cops, sorry, this is not snitching. But if snitching is calling the cops on your neighbors who are throwing a party, then, you are a definite pussy.
So, draw your own conclusions, but it is not a simple black and white ordeal (no pun intended).
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But dude, we need more stuff to rap about!
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im so glad this guy is here to tell black folks what to do. thats just what will solve racism in America: white people telling black people what to do.
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Hey Phansalkar- Stop fuckin’ snitchin’!
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9:52am I said public school is designed to produce very predictable, fearful, obedient pupils. And “snitching” as a general policy in life leads to this goal. Examples: your coworker is late—you snitch on him; somebody jumps in line at the supermarket, you snitch; somebody cheats on their taxes, you snitch.
I’m not saying that a person should overlook these things. In the past, these things were handled locally. Snitching entails alerting higher authority without addressing the problem directly.
IP hash: d1ddd774
This article and most of the peoples’ responses here make me ashamed to be a student at this university. I can’t believe we are considered a liberal campus and yet their is such much ignorance on this campus about race and non-white culture. Get yourself some perspective before you start telling a whole group of people how they should act and organize. You’re a well off college student who knows nothing of the pressures and persecution of poor blacks in this country. You know nothing about what its like to get victimized and harrased by the very institutions that are supposedly there to help you. Why would you work with a system that systematically persecutes you? You have no right to tell these people how they should live and you have no basis to judge them. You are trying to convince us that some middle-class 20 something year old college student knows more than a whole community of people? Give me a break.
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“Never snitch to the locals or the feds See they tryna break us off so they don’t have to break bread Cause Uncle Same ain’t the baker, he’s the butcher We all on “Punk’d” with no Ashton Kutcher Where ballin (no broke) cutthroats kaput ya Ain’t never took dope but them dopes done took ya Stop flyin Ol’ Glory man, cut it down If your job ain’t payin right, shut it down If your cat got 18’s, let it pound and if we ever gon’ do it let’s do it now!” -THE COUP
Hell yea!
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“Don’t you realize the only respectable way to make a living if you are from the hood is by playing professinal sports, rapping, or selling drugs? Everything else is for those who want to be enslaved by the white man.”
Who pays professional sports players? Who produces rappers records? And where do the drugs come from that are sold? These fit into the very statement you made at the end.
IP hash: 2e220e5a
The “stop snitchin” mindset is no different than white southerners back in the day being silent about people they knew who were in the KKK that lynched a black man or burned down his house. Only now, we have the “black KKK” (RE: Jason Whitlock) doing havoc on their own community, and occassionally commiting hate crimes against whites in the manner that they did on live television to Reginald Denny—-all because he made the mistake of driving while white during a race riot, and while many blacks just stood around out of apathy, or because they condoned it, or because they feared being treated in like manner by the thugs—-basically the same thing that empowered the KKK in the south: thugs putting whites in fear of doing tohe right thing. Now the thugs in the “black KKK” are doing the same thing, via fear and intimidation, in keeping otherwise well-meaning blacks from doing the right thing—-all the while their community and the country as a whole is going to hell.
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yooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! wats good homie?