“I MADE IT !”

As soon as you make it from the hood as a rapper (really as anything in the entertainment industry but for the sake of this example I'll use the rapper), one of the things that they typically do to tell everyone that “i made it” is buy a diamond chain. This chain is no small purchase on a basic scale. If i had to guess it would cost anywhere from $10000-$50000.  But the interesting part to me  isn’t the price, it's the fact that I’ve never seen that purchase go to a black jewelry store owner. Which is interesting to think about; seeing as if the main people who are buying this jewelry are American African  people. The store owner is usually White or Asian  so with each purchase that's $10000-$50000 going into their pockets and out of ours. 

I also see that they would even celebrate alongside of you; they’ll open a nice bottle of champagne, pour a glass for you and your friend’s, and toast to the good life!. In your head its “N* I’m up”, in their head its “we just came up” but only one mindset is the truth. They are making a killing off the mindset that we have of “because I have this physical item of value, I am succeeding” which has (for decades now) been planted in the minds of our people. Now, this same chain that you spent all of your hard earned money on can unfortunately be the exact thing that could cost you your life and the crazy part is, your life could get taken by the hands of a person with the exact same mindset! The mindset that persuaded you into getting the chain which shows evidence that this is a widespread mindset. In other words: You buy the chain, You then proceed to lose your life over the chain (which can also lead to the incarceration of the person who wanted to take the chain from you) all while the jeweler is kicking their feet up after experiencing a nice payday.

Now the blame should not go to the jewelry store owner. All they are doing is capitalizing on an opportunity that gives them everything to gain and nothing to lose. The blame is appointed to a system that made us this way but even worse than that the blame goes towards us for continuing to live within those means and not gaining the knowledge in order to evolve past it.  Bu ayet, I guess it's hard to want to put down the materialistic approach when you are blinded by the shiny diamonds of that cuban link that “what cha name” got on.