Michael Vick, Dogfighting and Hip Hop

Why are people so shocked about Michael Vick and the dogfighting story?  Don't they know that dogfighting is a staple of hip hop?  And just like Don Imus wasn't the first to use the phrase "nappy headed ho's", Vick wasn't the first NFL baller to be involved with dogfighting.

Hip hop has been celebrated for decades but it was hijacked back in the nineties by this "criminal culture" that okays treating all women like whores, solving any problem with violence, and being hard or walking around with a serious attitude.  Many of these guys refuse to smile because that means you're soft.  It's the culture of the penitentiary.  You have to keep your guard up at all times.  That "pants hanging off your butt style" is modeled after the prisoners in jail because they don't let them have any belts.

Allen Iverson was very popular in Hip hop because he rarely smiled and bowed down to no one.  If you notice you won't see Vick smiling a lot,either.  Walking around with a frown is being hard and that's as hip hop as dogfighting.  This prison culture has been adopted by many African-American youngsters and that's why so many of them wind up in the penitentiary.   In many inner citiy neighborhoods throughout the nation, if you haven't been away to prison, then they act like something's wrong with you.  The youngsters at the Youth Study Center in Philadelphia where I volunteer at, ask me, "Mr. Cobb have you ever done a bid".  I say , "No".  Doing a bid is going away to prison.

Let's get back to the dogfighting part of the culture. You can find dogfighting going on in parts of Philadelphia and Camden if you look hard enough.  For years in hip hop magazines like The Source, gangsta rappers have been shown with their bad dogs (mostly pit bulls) and their scantilly-clad ho's.  Gangsta rappers have three vices, dogfights, strip joints and blunts ( marijuana).  You think it's a coincidence that so many NFL players get caught with marijuana.  Do you think it's a coincidence that Vick and Iverson have been tied to marijuana controversies?

People are amazed by what Clinton Portis said in defense of Vick.  He said that people should mind their own business.  You can tell by what he said, that he doesn't see anything wrong with dogfighting.  Did you hear All-Pro offensive lineman Chris Samuels laughing in the background?  It didn't seem he was taking it all that serious.  If this superstar running back and offensive linemen don't see anything wrong with dogfighting then you know there are others in the league who feel the same way.