MTV Video Music Awards... SUCK

I am so pissed off at MTV. Even more than usual. I almost threw the remote at the TV.

So we were sitting watching the Video Music Awards because my daughter wants to.

And I was ready to settle in for a night of being bored watching really bad outfits and poor lipsyncing. But then they talked about the movie Rize and how it documents the "Clowning" and "Crumping" styles of dancing that originated in LA over the last few years. So my ears perked up, because I'd heard about the movie and was interested in seeing what the dancing looked like.

So the dancers come out, including the guy who stared it all, Tommy the Clown. And this is pretty cool, because this guy single-handed started a whole new dance thing, where in gang areas, kids are able to get into the dancing and being left alone by the gangs because they respect the clowning and crumping groups. It's a real dance thing started in the streets by the kids in the streets, not a bullshit fad with millions of studio dollars behind it. Clowning and Crumping are basically the antithesis of MTV. The dancers are doing something that takes hip hop away from the hell it's currently in, where every star idolizes what's basically the lifestyle of rich retirees in Florida.

So the dancers being on TV is really big, because not many people saw Rize because it was in limited release. And not many people know about this stuff. This could be the way this genuinely hip hop form of expression breaks out all over the place. They start to dance, and I am excited to see the crazy energetic moves they are doing.

For about two seconds. And then MTV starts acting like MTV, cutting to the audience so we can see the reactions of celebrities to the dancers. Because that's what the average American, in the mind of MTV, wants to see --who wants to see the performers on the stage perform when we can watch the celebrities watch the performers? And then we back to the dancing for about a quarter of a second. And then back to another famous person. And then back to the dancers. And so it goes for about fifteen seconds, and that's the end of the vital, energetic, REAL hip hop of the evening. And no one knows anything more about Crumping and Clowing because back to everyone trying to look like really old rich people...

I don't know why I got angry. I mean, it's MTV. It's ALWAYS sucked. At least today there's music on MTV tonight. And my daughter's happy.