When it comes to making headlines, rapper and everyone’s favorite “truth teller” Boosie is no stranger to being some people’s problematic fave. Whether it be his ongoing lovers’ contention with Lil Nas X, unwarranted parenting rants to Dwyane Wade and Gabrielle Union, or purchasing adult sex workers for his 13-year-old, Boosie just can’t seem to keep out of the public eye. So it should come as no surprise that the rapper was recently arrested in Georgia during a traffic stop.
With the current state of the world, you’ve gotta ask yourself the easy question, why? Why was Boosie pulled over in the first place, and the answer is simple? Officers said they noticed dark window tints and police may or may not have used fear-mongering to encourage the duo to exit the vehicle where they then found 11 grams of marijuana.
Boosie begins a tirade that puts most of his homo and transphobic rants to shame. The rapper can be seen and heard giving the police what we in the Black community would call “da business.” And if I’m honest, as ignorant as it was I give it an 8 out of 10.
This man let go more F-bombs than NWA on their first tour. Still, somehow all I saw was another Black man with issues to be sorted through with no real way to communicate them beyond feeling like a perpetual target. We see this in a lot of Black men and ask why, but is that question now perpetually rhetorical? We know why. So many Black men are forced to bottle up their real emotions which releases as rage.
During one point of the interaction between Boosie and the officers, he yelled “I can’t keep going through this, bro. I can’t, bro. I don’t do no wrong,” Boosie said. “I got to go to y’all superiors and file charges. This is harassment. Every day, I can’t even live. I moved to the country to fucking live, bro.”
Although the rapper belittled, berated, and downright verbally abused the officers on the scene in a way that I clutched my pearls, I couldn’t tear my eyes away.
This cycle of denying black men the space to vent beyond feelings of what may be a life or death situation has to be tiring and against my better judgment, I beg to ask if the cuffs were necessary and if we’ve been going about this all wrong from day one? What happens if instead of promoting his antics, laughing, or judging we took time to foster more mental health and safe spaces for Black men to understand their anger.
Though Boosie was let go, the behavior displayed was still proof, at least to me, that it’s more than just Boosie being Boosie. What does it hurt to simply be real with not only this Black man but all Black men? What happens when we hold space for them to speak uninterrupted and without judgment. Sure, today we all laugh at Boosie’s outburst, but what happens if that outburst was really an outcry and we missed it because we desensitized the way we see Black men showing emotion so much so that it no longer matters how they do it?
