Extreme poverty is often making less then $1-$2 dollars a day... buddy. There is a huge difference between living in the projects in some US city and some shantytown in a war torn city. Even in my time in South America, I saw shantytowns (favelas in Brazil)...
I respect people who make money and get themselves out of poverty. I mean the former PResident of Brazil was a shoeshiner.... I like to hear stories about it. But the music industry today prohibits many new artists in coming in. The rap music industry is perhaps the worst at this. They have their established artists. If you don't work with 50, Eminem, Jay Z... you're out of luck.
YOu have to wonder why Wale has had such a hard time getting into the industry. And he's one of the best rappers there is.
what is the difference again? you act as if people in the projects have money when most people don't even make enough to live on their own otherwise they wouldn't be in the projects to begin with. you act as if the projects are a nice place to live. why don't you google places like queensbridge houses, techwood homes, east lake meadows, cabrini green, robert taylor projects, magnolia projects to name a few to see if you would want to live in any of those places. last time i remembered they were tearing down projects because they were deemed uninhabitable places to live. believe me, i sure as hell would not want to live in a place where i would have to dodge bullets, shootouts, have to sleep in a bathtub to avoid stray bullets, have to join a gang or whatever for protection and basically be forced to live a soldier on a warzone. plus poverty is trying to live off of an income where you pretty much have to take care of other people with whatever little money you receive. just imagining trying to feed 3 kids by yourself working at mcdonalds for minimum wage. you would go to school and etc but you have nobody to help you out. what options do you have? a lot of people are in this situation living in america and you're busy trying to compare poverty here to elsewhere in the world. somebody living in poverty isn't trying to hear that shit. they basically want a better life because who the hell wants to be living in poverty. there's some people in this country that can't even afford shoes and can't even afford food to put in their mouths. that's why there's people that are scratching their heads at our government busy trying to feed the kids in other countries WHEN we have kids over here that are starving too. there used to be commercials about feeding starving kids in america but i guess they pulled them off the air for whatever reason.
i see what you're saying and coming from but this is not entirely true. the rappers you named 50, eminem, and jay-z all had to start from somewhere. jay-z was rapping for years before he was able to blow up how he did. he couldn't get a record deal so he decided to get together with two of his then friends (dame dash and kareem biggs) to start rocafella records. they got a distribution deal through some record label, i think, and they put out his first album that way. eventually, they caught def jam's attention and def jam started distributing his record. they put out his other albums. after his second album tanked, he put out hard knock life vol 2 which was about to retire if he flopped again and he ended up going 6 times platnium. eminem went through a similar story. he rapped for years trying to get a record deal, tried to put out an album independently, ended up flopping hard. almost killed himself because of it, got back up on his feet, kept rapping, decided to join the rap olympics, almost won it but lost. he caught the attention of dr. dre and the rest of history.
50 cent is even a better story. i remember when he first came out and this guy was a NOBODY. a complete nobody. this was before get rich or die tryin. he was rapping back in 99, he was supposed to have an album drop the next year on columbia records. he ends up in a dispute with a rival rap group, murda inc which was connected to a big time drug dealer, kenneth "supreme" mcgriffth, which leds to him getting shot up 9 times, dropped from his label and blacklisted. he ends up putting out mixtapes independently, forming g-unit with his two friends from the same block as him, catches the attention of eminem and gets signed to shady and aftermath records. i can say the same thing for how many other rappers. drake, lil wayne, the wu tang clan, etc. all of these people had to work hard to get to where they're at. all of them. their success didn't fly into their hands. that's why i applaud anybody that is able to get a record deal especially from another rapper they have no connection to.
wale???? you're talking about wale aka whoopi goldberg being great? the reason why he has a hard time blowing up is because he sucks. i heard his first album with the song with lady gaga where he raps over the sample with the "hey hey goodbye" song and BOY, does he suck. i also heard that he likes to act like a diva too and that a lot of people in the industry can't stand his ass either. but you're forgetting that wale is signed to rick ross' maybach music record label. he is being cosigned by another rapper. maybe wale just sucks because i haven't heard any good songs from him EVER.
, i agree. that ironic song is my shit though.
at noreaga if i were you. lol @ that video where his fat ass was trying to dance in the sand with those models. how tragic. for anyone that hasn't seen it. here it is.
