When Posing Goes Wrong: Ricky Rozay is not about that life.

(pic from allhiphop.com)

Rapper Ricky Rozay aka “Rick Ross” or Ricky False as I like to call him has reached the top of the rap game. With a smooth delivery his flows reflects the life of an imaginary drug lord with all the glitz and glamor, the former correctional officer has taken this character and acted his way to the top. Guns, Money, and Drugs is the code he lives by (well at least in raps). However, recently the imitation gangster life has finally caught up to him. 

Over the last the few months Rozay has been in the crosshairs from the real life gangstas he loves to imitate, particularly the gang “Gangster Disciples.” Rozay upset the gang when he name dropped (which he loves to do) founder Larry Hoover in his song. The gang basically told Rozay to pay up or he is a dead man, and now recently Rozay had his car shot up in the streets of South Florida. 

I recently read a letter that South Florida rap legend Uncle Luke wrote to Rozay encouraging him to stop perpetrating the gangsta life. Uncle Luke dropped some jewels of truth down to Rozay with such lines as : “Hip-hop has a rich history of college guys who never committed a crime rapping about moving kilos of cocaine and taking out snitches,” and “Every gangster rapper takes on the role of a real hood legend to build up street cred.”  Uncle Luke urged Rozay to squash his beefs for his life is really at stake with this line: “But I don’t want you to fall into the trap of believing you are really a gangster. Trust me, you don’t want to go out like Biggie Smalls or Tupac. It’s time you squash your beefs.”

Uncle Luke words go deeper than Rozay’s situation. These days the mainstream hip hop scene is full of wanna be gangstas, and us as a people we support it like the no other. We listen to songs about drug dealing when most of us have never even sold candy. We listen to songs about guns and murders and a good number of us have never even fired a gun and for sure never killed anyone. Our youth listen to these lyrics from these beloved entertainers and take it as gospel. Many take the glorified side of street life as reality and they do not see the dangerous reality until it is too late. Rozay could change the world if he just changed his message. He has the ears of the people especially the youth, he could fill their minds with knowledge and truth. Sadly I don’t see this coming into fruition anytime soon. My hopes and prayers that Rozay understands where his “act” has taken him and changes his ways, not only for his own life but for many lives that look up to him.

We have to stop supporting destruction in our community. The mainstream has taken Willie Lynch and put him over a tight beat and hook, now we are all dancing to destruction. We are at the point now where we are demanding what the mainstream supplies, when the mainstream should be supplying what the people demand. Real people need real music. The people need music we can relate to, and not about some fantasy life that most of us care not to be involved in. Until we decide as a people that we want more out of entertainers, the ignorance will continue. Live real or die fake.