OK, so my world would never normally intersect with the world of heavy UK teen rap (or whatever the correct name is for the genre), but I was with my DS at a barber shop today, a trendy one where they show the latest music videos, and while his hair was being cut I happened to see the video to a song called Hello Mate by this guy AarDee (Googling him I see he is 19 and comes from Brighton).
I am very far from prudish or pearl-clutching, was a pretty counter-culture heavy rocker in my day etc. I've seen and done a lot. I am not easily shocked and am strongly in favour of freedom of expression. But: this video has to be seen to be believed. Unless I am mistaken and I was watching some sort of elaborate piss-take, it depicts a couple (AarDee and a girl) going into a shop with a baseball bat and gaffer tape, terrorising and tying up the staff, wrecking the shop, stealing stuff including lots of booze and then retreating to a mansion to celebrate merrily with a huge pool party. The main dude "AarDee" has a constant arrogant and self-satisfied look on his face.
Now, I am sure many people would agree that this guy is probably an arrogant little twerp (irrespective of the merits of the music, which would be subjective, but which I imagine a lot of people like, given his apparent popularity). And the entertainment/music industry has always been full of arrogant twerps and worse, obviously. So that's no big deal. But this is a graphic video, presumably aimed at teens as the boy is a teen, totally glorifying crime and violence, revelling in it. I had a look around the internet for what I imagined would be multiple mentions of this angle, but all I could find was fulsome praise of the guy and his music, including this song. No-one mentioning what the video actually shows. This is just normal then?
Am I alone in thinking this is a real problem? Am I missing something here?