Where’s the public outcry over Chicago boy’s raunchy rap video?
BY MARY MITCHELL marym@suntimes.com
13-year-old rapper Lil' Mouse from the video "Get Smoked" storyidforme: 34964371
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fileheaderid: 5878258 YouTube: Videos with kids should never be violent Public responds to Lil’ Mouse’s rap video Updated: August 9, 2012 6:50PMWhen a 13-year-old boy shows up in a rap video cursing like a grown man, flashing money and posing with a gun, his parents and other adults involved are morally bankrupt. Unfortunately, there has been no public outcry over a raunchy video titled “Lil Mouse Get Smoked” that debuted on YouTube on July 4, and has since Blo wn up the Internet. Nearly 300,000 people have viewed it, making the 13-year-old the latest rap sensation to come out of Chicago.Known as “Lil Mouse,” the baby-faced rapper repeatedly drops “F” and “N” bombs in a music video that glorifies sex, drugs and violence. At one point, an adult male gets behind the teen and makes it look like the teen is holding the gun. On popular music video sites, the teen, who allegedly lives in Roseland, is being promoted as the “13-year-old rapper from the Wild, Wild Hundreds.”The gangster-style music video is even more profane when you consider that Chicago is desperately trying to reduce gang- and drug-related violence that helped push the homicide rate up nearly 40 percent and claimed the lives of so many of the city’s children.Here’s just a sample of what “Lil Mouse” has to say:“I’m rollin’, all my n----s rollin’.30 clip and them hollow tips have his a-- sitting in RoselandFloating off a pill, p**** bad’ll killMy n---- in the field; you might get killed….Melly got the .30 on his hip, he gone need some helpI’m a gangster, n----, and I could do this s--- my f------ self”When this kind of filth comes out of a child’s mouth, there’s no one to blame but the parents. Obviously, in neighborhoods where people are struggling to get by, having a kid break into the music industry is huge.Still, there is such a thing as going too far and “Get Smoked” is a good example of where too far takes us. When young black males were exploited by the music industry to promote the gangster lifestyle, most of us said nothing.Now the industry is hooking teenagers.“This warrants an investigation,” said Che “Rhymefest” Smith, a Chicago rapper who ran a spirited but unsuccessful campaign for alderman in the 20th Ward. “This has clearly crossed over into child pornography when you have a 13-year-old child rapping about sex and about violence and drug selling. They are probably already under investigation,” he said.P. Noble, the videographer who shot the video in Roseland, claims “Lil Mouse” wasn’t holding the gun.“I made sure of it. When I got to the set, I made sure that Mouse did not have any guns or drugs on him,” he told me. Noble claimed not to know the names of any of the adults involved in making the video but said the boy’s mother and adult uncles were on the set.“I was hired to do video direction. Somebody called me and I showed up. I didn’t realize a gun was in the video. So much was going on and there were a lot of people behind him. I wasn’t trying to glorify anything,” he said.The gun is clearly visible in several scenes.“But a lot of young people in Chicago live and survive in that subculture. It is a sad reality. It’s an epidemic,” Noble concluded.Chase Davis is listed as the producer of “Get Smoked.” Davis did not return several phone calls. Rhymefest claims Lil Mouse represents a new “culture of rap music from Chicago that is glorifying violence and drugs.”“We find that artists who glorify death in Chicago are being rewarded,” he said.For instance, Chief Keef, another Chicago teen who raps about violence, recently landed a deal with the Interscope record label that is reportedly worth millions. But last December, the then 16-year-old wasn’t much of a celebrity. In fact, he was a big part of the problem that continues to make life unbearable in some neighborhoods on the South and West Sides.Keef was arrested in the Washington Park neighborhood when police arrived on the scene and found a suspect pointing a gun at them. Chief Keef was one of two young men arrested. The rapper was charged with unlawful use of a weapon and had to do 60 days of house arrest — at his grandmother’s house, no less — according to a report in the Beachwood Reporter.“Record labels are exploiting the violence in Chicago at the expense of young people who are being used to do it,” argues Rhymefest, who has publicly taken Chief Keef to task, calling him a spokesman for the “prison industrial complex.”“This is new for rappers in Chicago,” he said.“We have to go after the producers and labels and create some way young people can express themselves and be heard,” he said.“But if guns and b------ is the only thing that is getting attention, then that is what young people are going to do. I am trying to save those artists before they cross over to the dark side.”To that end, Rhymefest is spearheading “The Pledge Mixtape,” a CD that brings together rappers in Chicago to produce positive music about life as opposed to death.“We want to highlight positive artists that tell the truth. The majority of young people are not selling drugs. They are not killing each other, and they have aspirations,” Rhymefest said.“Everybody has a rap and a dream. “Clearly, you don’t need a lot of talent, just a hustle,” he said. “There is some adult barricading these teens, and you have to get around these adults.”Because of “Get Smoked,” Lil Mouse is not on the corner or hanging on the street, said Noble, who claims his phone has been ringing off the hook with inquiries about the young rapper. Still, what’s taking place in “Get Smoked” is child exploitation and depicts behavior that is detrimental to the moral development of a child. That can’t be ignored.For more information about “The Pledge Mixtape,” go to blackyouthproject.com.
Deborah E. LeviManager of Program Support & OperationsOffice of Early Childhood
Illinois Department of Human Services
(312) 793.4266 Telephone (312) 793.4881 Faxdeborah.e.levi@illinois.gov
