"Get Rich [and] Die Trying"
Black, Male celebrities and the seemingly impossible quest of growing old.
Dave Simpson / WireImage via Getty Images
I woke up yesterday morning like I typically do, in installments. This was a Saturday, so fortunately alarms were not a factor. Wafting through varying levels of consciousness, I opened my eyes, reshuffled on the bed, in the failed attempt at securing a few more minutes of sleep. Then, due to an expertly crafted Social Media addiction, grabbed the phone which lays on (or next to) the bed, scrolling through my top three digital vices; Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
The thing about Social media, especially first thing in the morning, is you usually have to scroll through all three to get the full story of any specific incident. On Facebook I saw friends remarking about FatMan Scoop, sending well wishes, there was discussion about his performance in Hamden, CT the night before. Apparently he’d collapsed on stage, was rushed to the hospital, and the crowd was quickly ushered into a powerful prayer.
When these things happen, and they frequently do, my mind flies to the moments where I’ve been impacted by the work and art of [insert subject here]. With Fatman Scoop (aka. Isaac Freeman, III), these moments were common; I’d spent many nights in dark nightclubs, lounges and house parties lying openly to the sounds of “Be Faithful” pretending that I had a hundred dollar bill (sometimes even a twenty). I was immediately lulled into a sea of nostalgia.
Within a half hour, the world would learn through Scoop’s tour manager, Birch Michael, that the legendary entertainer had passed. He was 53 years old.
“Being Black and growing old shouldn’t be this hard.” - Shane Paul Neil
In college I met a Counselor who would become my therapist. We had several conversations interrogating masculinity and patriarchy as general concepts, from those conversations I can still hear the urgency in his voice as he shouted “MEN ARE DYING!!!” It was a thing he evangelized, being a clinician on a college campus where most things were afforded to us; subsidized counseling, subsidized condoms, subsidized health clinics - most men felt no calling to engage in services. Which continues to be stunning as we were all struggling profoundly, especially Black men living in a predominantly white institution.
As one of the few who did engage, we heard his exasperation and brushed it off the way most 20 somethings would. Now, freshly in my forties, it feels like my turn to scream, more pointedly that “[BLACK] MEN ARE DYING!!!”
Nipsey Hustle is a name I’d long seen on rap blogs like “You Heard That New,” “RapRadar,” and “NahRight,” an independent artist deciding to shift the way music was distributed. He spent over a decade growing in prominence, seemed to be breaking through. After a nationally televised performances, songs entering the Billboard Top 100 charts, and releasing his aptly titled album “Victory Lap” in 2018, he was slain in front of his “The Marathon Continues” store in March of 2019.
The story continues to repeat itself:
Young Dolph, an artist building a name for himself in Memphis…
Pop Smoke, an artist building a name for himself in New York…
Takeoff, a standout member of The Migos, making a name for himself in Georgia…
In fact, while trying to digest the most recent in a series of Black, male celebrity deaths, I grabbed my phone and started making a list of the lives cut short (the ones that I can remember).
Kobe Bryant
Chadwick Boseman
Bushwick Bill
Heavy D
Phife Dawg
Eazy E
The Notorious B.I.G.
Tupac Shakur
Big L
Fred The Godson
Kay Slay
Tenor Saw
Freaky Tah
Ol’ Dirty Bastard
BeatKing
Black Rob
Craig Mack
DMX
Michael K. Williams
Tiny Lister
Robin Harris
Bernie Mac
David A. Arnold
Just for clarity, these are just celebrity deaths. I have intentionally opted out of naming our brothers who have been unjustly ended at the hands of America’s “justice” system.
“Life as a shorty shouldn’t be so rough.” - Inspectah Deck (Wu-Tang)
BLACK MEN ARE DYING!!!
This isn’t meant to be prescriptive, I have no suggestions for how to stem the tide. It may just be my responsibility to point out the flow.
I’ve learned recently that something happens when you get to forty, if you’re fortunate enough to get there; your metabolism doesn’t operate in the same way. Weight loss becomes more difficult and this becomes a time where your eating habits, your vitamin/supplement intake, creating a consistent wellness practice becomes paramount. I am urging Black men, and those who love us to understand that we’re needed. That growing old shouldn’t be aspirational, it should just be.
We are all a sum total of experiences and the things that we observe. We have entered a really interesting space in Hip Hop culture where luminaries who provided the soundtrack to our lives are growing old enough to help us shape and contextualize our adulthoods. It’s hard to put in words how necessary this is. A genre believed to be a young person’s sport is now brimming with OGs. We get to see Nas delve into venture capitalism, investing in companies like Bevel and Ring Security Systems. Dropping albums that detail divorce and life after, rediscovering the rap itch and rattling off six acclaimed projects while eyeing his fiftieth birthday.
We’re watching Snoop Dogg evolve into a global ambassador, bringing eyes to the Olympics while Flavor Flav sponsors athletes and helps US track stars make rent. We get to see Jay-Z collaborate with younger artists, setting his legal team on music executives to end and amend predatory recording contracts, ensuring that they get a fair shake. Musicians are influencing elections, changing lexicon, becoming parents (and grandparents).
We have moved into a reality where Big Boi is a falconer while Andre 3000 can be found walking through cities all over the world playing his wooden flute. We have drifted far from when we had to be reminded that “The South’s got something to say.” Ice-T no longer hears police knocking on his door at 6 in the morning… today, he is the Special Victims Unit doing the knocking. Moses “Shyne” Barrow, once a deportee forced to live in Belize is now Leader of the Opposition in their House of Representatives, drumming up support to eventually become the country’s Prime Minister.
I wonder where we would be if everyone was afforded the luxury of a fully realized life? Perspective is the gift of time, being able to see the entire story. We rarely get an opportunity to see people evolve and change over the course of time.
We are losing brain trust, possibilities, legacies.
We are losing our models of Black male adulthood.
Partially quoting Dallas Cowboy’s legend Michael Irving: “This is what’s wrong with today; the young [men] today, they’re not learning from [dads], how to [grow and impact lives]. We’re losing recipes!!!”