Sunday, October 16, 2011

Anonymous....that cypher wahala

After a few classes last week I'm firmly convinced that my last semester in uni is going to be a doozy, the volume of work is frightening to say the least. As I type this I'm just recovering from a rough 7 hour study sesh, so rough in fact that I missed the twitter brouhaha between Nigerian celebrities and civilians all because of some BET cypher or something like that. 

As a fan of Wacka Flocka Flame and any rap song which can be comfortably qualified under the "hoodrat" category, I didn't even put mouth in the debate, its ovbious I know bupkes about rap. In my own personal opinion I think its pretty awesome that Nigerian rappers are so internationally recognized as to be asked to appear on BET and people should appreciate the fact instead of running them down which I have come to realize is done simply because these people can, and not because they genuinely think the artistes did that badly.

The internet has given the gutless multitude the perfect outlet to unleash their acidic vitriol under the guise of anonymity. These nameless, faceless vermin sit behind their computer screen, flex the muscles of their fingers and decide to put whatever nonsense has been rattling around in their heads out there for everybody to see. The phenomenon of cyber bullying has been going on for years and Nigeria was slow to catch up, but of course as a nation that refuses to carry last we have made it our own, spewing rubbish on twitter and as comments on blogs. We are lucky that most Nigerians are too thick skinned to allow what they read about themselves to get to them. The US and the UK are rife with accounts of people committing suicide over things like this or even killing their attackers. 

Nigerians will moan over it for a while and move on. Our strength as a nation lies in our resilience and indifference to hardship.

For the sake of those who are not on twitter, someone tweeted that an artist who was a part of the BET cypher "didn't try" and the artist replied saying "na your papa wey no try", or something along those lines.

Initially when I saw that tweet I was amazed, like how could the artiste be that careless as to type that. The fact that you decide to put yourself in the public eye dictates that you be ready to deal with the praise as well as the criticism that comes with the job. I even tweeted my feelings saying the artiste had zero PR skills.

I then decided to go through the artistes mentions, the insults I saw there left me weak. All day, since the cypher aired people had been of course airing their opinions, who they liked and who they didn't. Let me just say that constructive criticism is not a bad thing, expressing your dislike of an artiste's ability is not wrong, that's what the public is there for, but of course Nigerians have no stop button. People had been insulting this particular artiste all day long and not restricting it to just his musical ability, saying random, senseless things that made me believe the government should start some kind of Internet Proficiency Exam before people are allowed to have internet access. The fact that that person does not know you and cannot harm you does not give you the right to take out your frustration on that person. I say frustration because you have to really have bad things going on in your life to decide to constantly cuss someone out for no reason.

After reading the artistes mentions and seeing what he had to put up with all day I understood how he could have "snapped" and tweeted that reply. People have popped off for far less than what I read today.

People constantly insulting these artistes forget that they are human beings with real feelings and no matter how disciplined or how much PR lessons they've had to ignore such attacks, some people can reach their limit pretty quickly. 

Now I'm not in support of what that particular artiste tweeted, he should have handled it better or just ignored it but I'm just saying that  people should be more understanding of others feelings. Celebrities have a tougher time than most because their work is out there for people to comment on as they please, but we should be mindful of the fact that it is their work, these people are trying to build a career out of doing something that they love and when we say all these hateful things, we're seriously messing with their sense of self.

I understand the "joy" in tweeting something mean for the short lived pleasure of a few RTs and mentions but I've realised that I've only being doing more harm than good. I've made an effort when criticizing a particular artiste's work to confine it to that, their work. Keep their personal lives out of it, keep their families out it and keep whatever cheap shots you've been practicing, to yourself. 

I've been on the receiving end of a few "cheap shots" myself, some people, anonymous of course leaving some comments on my blog that left me wondering if I had murdered someone they knew due to the hatefulness of their comments. In fact some attacks have been so personal I'm pretty convinced that they are people I know.

Still, as I said above, for you to decide to attack someone be it on a blog or on twitter for no apparent reason just because you can leads me to believe that these people don't have much going on in their lives and are of course cowards or as they say in Westeros, craven (had to throw that in there, I love that word). 

If you are really such a tough person quit trying to caps lock someone's ass and attempt to do it for real, see if you don't lose a few teeth.

Love and light xx
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14 comments

  1. THIS!!!!! For God's sake if someone has nothing good to say just shut the eff up!!

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  2. I thought Naeto C was very wrong for that his tweet o, abi are u guys friends this one ur defending him? But i understand where ur coming from , people can be unduly harsh on the internet

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  3. Nigerians have a phd in hating,we can hate for Africa. Theres so much trurh in this post,we reaaly need to lay off celebrities

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  4. Nice post. What you said makes so much sense cos at the end of the day these celebrities are just flesh and blood like each and everyone of us.

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  5. TWP watch the negative comments roll in now, pple will deliberately attack you now. Whatever, I love you still sha, you rock.

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  6. THIS IS THE TRUTH!
    Sometimes I shake my head and wonder if these people have nothing to do with their lives. I don't blame naeto c for that response. Although he is a celebrity.. He is a human being with feelings. I can't imagine how much work they put in to be the best at what they do.. Only for people to insult their work and creativity. Absolutely not fair.
    The heart of man is desperately wicked and people constantly seek one's downfall.
    Even in fashion,it's the same thing.
    that was how someone made a rant on twitter today about my knowledge of fashion/styling being limited to outfits i put on, the numbers of red carpet i have walked on and the number of blogs i browse through daily. yet,here i am,working so hard and assisting fashion creatives to better my craft. the thing pained me,yet i had to keep my cool. i cant blame naeto c at all. even if he was wrong, khaki no be leather.. mind no be firewood!

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  7. Wow...I had heard nothing bout this controversy b4 now(thx to not being on twitter), but reading this article I was convinced it would be Naeto C... I saw d Cypher n I immediately popped up on my seat happy bout seeing Naija artists out there (thumbs up) I have no idea d depth of d twitter yaps, but truth be told Naeto C's rap was poor anyone cld see dat...

    That said u made d necessary point- 'people need to learn to keep criticisms to d work n not the person...' but u know the internet is wat it is, instead of replying every diss from fans n critics artistes had beta develop a copin mechanism (u have to choose very carefully d kind of things u expose urself to, n wat u let affect u), cos dere'll b nothing worse dan derailing frm d focus (Making sellable albums) all cos of wat tom, dick, n harry said or didnt say on twitter. Personally I know the kind of news dat can make my mood take a real deep, once start seeing it, I tune out n go watch 'Pretty Woman' or sumthn light n fun...Its not everything I need to know about biko...

    Naeto C needs to re-grp n refocus n pour his energy (anger n all) into making a great nu album n if dat sells madly he would have silenced d critics! He's a word-based artist he shld learn to use d words wisely...the 'Anonymous' pple have nothing to lose!

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  8. Nice!!!! Have a post in draft on this(not the BET thingy) Virtue bullying/hating et co is on another level. Especially on blogs, many 'friends' hide behind the anonymous veil to spit their venom and air their hate... It's amazing.

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  9. Totally agree! I've noticed people, especially on twitter want to be that popular person that always has something mean/witty to say about everything. Annoying. Although I do think said artist could have avoided the come back he used, regardless of what people had been saying about him.

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  10. COWARDS......NIGERIANS are born Haters no be today

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  11. It is all the anonymouses! I just cant understand how people form brave, yet cower under the cloak of the internet to trash talk others. Like you have said, some just don't have the stop button. It is one thing to offer criticisms, it is another to outright just go on and on about bullcrap...People need Jesus!

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  12. err...okay. I had to look again to confirm if this was actually your blog I was reading.

    Nice post, but the very thing you criticize, you indulge in a LOT. You might wanna check your onslaught on people who happen to be in the eye of the needle as well next time. That way, when next you post something like this, it won't come off as hypocritical.

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  13. Nice post and very true. saw the cypher clip and had an opinion about it. It is mean spirited to go personal. keep it up, love your blog.

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  14. Even if you do not post this, I know you have read it. I totally agree with isetfiretotherain, I was reading your post and thinking 'but you also do this a whole lot on twitter i.e attacking and insulting people/celebs unecessarily. it all seems hypocritical to me really as in coming from you. well said isetfiretotherain.

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