The New Hustle

Violent crime is down in New York to the rates it was in the 60's. Yet you wouldn't know that from listening to gangsta rap, which seems stuck in the 80's New Jack city. More dudes got shot on mixtapes this year than in the streets. Ta-Nehisi Coates broke this down something wonderful in the Village Voice:

"The crash is complete, and in any black community you can find the rubble—uneducated, unemployable young black men. Their narrative no longer rings with the romance of a Nino Brown. Crack is played, and so, apparently, is fratricide—murder rates in the black community have been dropping since the mid '90s. The way of the gun still takes its toll, but Saigon has been pacified. Mundane afflictions like unpaid child support and industrial flight have once again come to the fore."

So the drug hustle is dead. But I see people hustling in the streets all the time. Only now they are dealing bootleg cd's and untaxed cigarettes, not blue tops. I can't walk to the train in my hood without getting offered loosies. Yup, bootlegging. For obvious reasons that's something rappers don't want to big-up in their rhymes.

My friend, who got scooped in East Harlem for selling heroin now hustles "authentic" throwback jerseys on Ebay. And he makes as much as he used to without all the danger. I like this new hustle.

Over on Fresh to Death I school the kids on the rules to the bootleg game.

Comments

[QRock639]

Cosigns on the throwback jersey comments. That's the move up here, I'm taking orders if anyone is interested. Crazy Eddie prices over here too! LT Exclusive Jersey for 75.00. Holla at me !