Dan,
Music, objectively defined, is supposed to contain notation, rhythm, melody, and harmony. Now, I am not an expert on those by any means but one could be completely correct on the assestion that "rap" isn't music. On that, you'd be better off asking someone other than myself. When it comes to rap, people are going to make judgements on it based primarily 2 criteria: the degree to which they derive pleasure from listening to it, or to it's cultural value. The pleasure factor will differ from person to person, so there is no big deal there, but can one make a pretty accurate statement about the cultural value of rap? I think so.
I consider music to be any type of sound arranged in a pattern to be rhythmic, melodic, harmonious, etc. Solo drumming is as much music as playing the classical guitar. I don't know if you can really make one assumption about hip hop or rap culture today. Maybe in 1996 you could but now it isn't all so negative or "gangsta".
I, as a white male, am getting quite tired of knowing that I will be passed over by less qualified minorities even though I may be FAR more skilled than them at a certain task.
Has this actually happened to you? Do they have some kind of affirmative action in NH?
I am also getting quite tired of people trying to guilt me for being successful and trying to blame me for all the ills of the world.
Sadly that is frequently other white people...but I know what you mean.
As far as the actions by those in the movie, perhaps it was that I thought their decisions were just so stupid and out of touch with reality that the became less human to me.
That is reasonable but I thought their extremes of action made it more human for me. Simply because their actions are what some of us may feel on a base level but our social mores don't allow us to do.
Ok, Matt Dillion's charachter saves the life of the woman he molested, but he was on his way to do it anyway before he knew who she was. Ok, so he saves her and they make it like he had some big revelation, but what was it? They just showed him helping his Dad like he was before, what is the conclusion?
The only revelation here was that human beings can be Satan or Jesus all in the same week. We all have both animal lust and compassion in our hearts, that is how I read his character.
The nice cop, perhaps as an act of contrition for his partner's horrible actions, offers a black guy a ride, and then winds up killing him in a completely justified circumstance. He then goes and burns his car, why? What was the change that occured, that crap happens? Perhaps, I don't know because the movie didnt tell us.
He burns his car simply to destroy the evidence. I think the movie was trying to show that it was an unjustified circumstance...the black guy was trying to make a human connection with the statue, to show that they have common ground and he got shot for it. Not because the white cop was evil, but because the white cop simply misunderstood his intentions.
Good discussion BTW.