Rap war

Rap war

Shots ring out in South Central Los Angeles. A man screams in horror.

This man has been shot in a heated gang war. This is everyday life for

gang members. Gang members are used to cold blooded murder and most

attend at least 5 funerals a week. Similar situations occur in Harlem,

New York and in other places around the country.

Why is this happening? Many people think that rap music is making kids

more violent. They think that rap music is just a glorification of

violence. All rap music is doing is to show how horrible and inhuman

life is in the ghettos across the country. This is what's really

happening out there. It's not fake.

Right now, there is a major conflict between West Coast and East Coast

rappers. East and West are fighting in a vicious battle that leaves

hundreds of poor, helpless people dead in the street. There's no reason

for this to be going on.

Back in the early '90's, when rap was beginning to become popular, the

East/West war wasn't quite there yet but it was slowly becoming more and

more obvious that there was a conflict between rappers. Part of the

reason that the war started was that West Coast rap dominated and nobody

questioned their supremecy. Ice Cube, Ice T, and Eazy E were the rappers

of the moment. The war slowly worsened when East Coast rappers began to

get more publicity. West Coast rappers were upset that they weren't 100%

in the spotlight so they started to make fun of East rappers in their

music proclaiming that East Coast rap was fake and couldn't top West

Coast. Then, East Coast rappers fired back obscenities at West Coast

rappers and it kept up like that until someone decided that the other

coast had gone too far.

In 1993, Sean Combs started Bad Boy Entertainment in New York and for

the first time ever, East Coast sales surpassed West Coast rap sales.

Suddenly, as if out of nowhere came the peak of the West/East feud.

Smaller gangs in cities took the example of the "big playaz" and

followed what they said. Before, local gangs killed for affiliation

whether you were a Blood or a Crip. Now, gangs were killing for West and

East. In some cities it was so bad that you could be killed for living

on the wrong side of the neighborhood.