Murder

Murder?

By, Shawn Harris

What’s up with our fixation with the word murder? Why has that word become so attractive to us? Whether termed murda team, murda capital, murda clique, murder squad, murda city, murda factory, murder game, or murder mitten. We’re using this word religiously & relentlessly. Some  say murder is the best way to describe their hood, block, state, company or crew . They say the word murder means serious, hard, or deadly. Some say murder is all they see all day everyday. But why celebrate it? Why personify it? Why epitomize it? Why become it? There is nothing more final than death. There is no act more irreversible. There is no recovery. Yet we play with death. We play with homicide. We flirt with murder. We speak it into existence through our conversations & through our music. We  celebrate it. Are you happy so many people die in your hood? Is that a reason to celebrate? Is it cool, does that make you happy that the children can’t play outside without being in danger? We can’t sit on the porch without the risk of being  becoming a victim of homicide. Is that a reason to celebrate? Is it cool that your little brothers & sisters can’t walk to school without ducking & dodging bullets? Is it fun? Is it exciting knowing your women could be raped and killed while returning home from work or school? Is that your idea of a good time, your mother being murdered? Your brother getting car jacked & murdered? Is that a reason to sing, rap & celebrate?  Trap house pumping. Dope dealers fighting. Gang bangers banging. Young people dying . Homicides by drive by. This makes you feel celebratory? And whose murdering who?  The lower class is killing the lower class. Brown on  brown, black on black crime. Even for so called entertainment, we stand in “cyphers” freestyling murder raps & crime rhymes. Every lyrical line is a murder plot or a tale of how creatively we can murder one another. In graphic detail we describe gun play & what the bullet does when it rips through human flesh & bone. We are fixated on murder. But athletes & rappers run for the suburbs when looking to raise their families. Most sports & entertainment stars move out the hood. They get out the ghetto. With the first check, their first house is purchased as far away from the block as they can go. You know why? Because murder ain’t fun. Homicides ain’t cool. They don’t wanna kill or be killed. They want to live. Running from police, ducking investigations & indictments or standing in line ups ain’t cool. Nor is the flip side. Attending funerals dressed in black kissing cold bodies in caskets. Sending floral arrangements & crying with clenched fists walking through cemeteries ain’t cool. Cleaning up crime scenes ain’t cool. Scrubbing up blood and brain matter off the wall ain’t cool. Yellow tape & bloody sheets in front of your house ain’t fun. Identifying the body of a loved one at the morgue ain’t fun. Murder is not to be celebrated. You don’t sing songs or write raps about murder. Hard core killers & criminals don’t even speak on murder. So how unauthentic, how fake do we appear when we’re singing & dancing, rapping & bragging about murder. How fake do we look when were tattooing the words “Assassin” “Hitman” and “Killer”  on our bodies. We are foolishly fixated on murder. When our minds marinate on murder, we magnetically attract and pull to ourselves potentially murderous situations. We attract to ourselves criminal conditions or the criminal elements responsible for murder and mayhem. We attract arguments & conflict. We walk around “too turned up” & hypersensitive. Mad on edge or paranoid. Some of us even anticipate getting into a fight or we’re secretly looking for a reason to actually kill somebody. Thought is the cause of action. We have to change our thinking. We have to think different thoughts. We need to feel different feelings. Let go of jealousy & envy. Let go of the resentment & bitterness. Let go of the vindictiveness & vengefulness. Those feelings, that mentally has the potential to lead to violence. To lead to murder. The body is a slave to mind, meaning your mind controls your body. Your mind controls your mouth. So think longer before you speak, before you sing and before you rap. Words can create, save & destroy. Be mindful when you speak on murder. You just might speak it into existence…