Effects of Videos on Youth

A detailed Summary of Effects of Videos on Youth

Our youth has grown up with MTV, BET and because of the entertainment value of these entities our youth have been led astray. Some of our youth can't distinguish between reality and the entertainment that the aforementioned media giants are feeding us. The trend toward baggy pants and hair that is uncombed has come from this culture that has prevailed the last ten years. Our youth have adopted every trend that has been shown through these mediums. The reality is that this has led to some behavior and dress that is not appropriate for all venues. The fascination with entertainers and athletes is not strictly a hip-hop generation thing but in this country Hollywood stars are treated like royalty. We need to do more to make Mac-Arthur genius award recipients, for example, as celebrated as Allen Iverson and Jay-Z, but we're up against resilient forces.

One thing that obsessive video viewing has done is to create for our youth a false sense of reality. For example our youth think that the lifestyles that are portrayed in the videos are real and not just for entertainment value. Kids imitate the behavior that they see on the screen and sometimes this leads to disrespect and other issues especially at schools. If you ask a youth what t

Many of us have done well defining our own realities, but we've also had some luck and some societal intervention. Of course we have to be accountable to ourselves and assume responsibility for educating our youth in terms of education, employment, sexual responsibility, etc., but we should never lose sight on the fact that a country has a responsibility to its citizens.

The question is how we can use the power of hip-hop to bring about social change. This can be done and it won't be through the lyrics necessarily but through the influence, joined by clear thinking activist and political theorists who've come of age in the hip-hop generation and who realize the power of hip-hop in terms of reaching and influencing young Black across the country. This is a generation that doesn't have to be politicized. This is a generation that needs to be organized. Public policy over the last two decades has politicized this generation.

Our only hope is that folks will begin to think differently about the possibilities for a mass political movement in our life time that will not only parallel the civil rights and Black power movements, but may in fact surpass them. We can hope that the civil rights/Black Power generation will think more deeply about helping these generations find their identity. The hip hop generation has to start thinking more deeply about our youth culture and our enormous responsibility that we have to pla

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Approximate Word count = 961
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics