💾 R.A.B.B. Entry #070 — STRAIGHT UP Dissected
🎭 Alias: The Tax Break Anthem
📼 Source: STRAIGHT UP (1990s Anti-Drugs PSA) — Watch here: https://youtu.be/W7KbEM65SB8?si=Z9S1_Wve8WLVfo8S
🧱 Layer 1 — The Setup: Rhymes, Raps, and Redirection
At surface level, this PSA looks like a noble attempt to stop kids from dealing or using drugs. You’ve got breakbeats, cops doing synchronized points, and a lineup of Black rappers calling for change.
But why Black rappers? Why us every time the moral panic needs a poster child?
Because we were never the audience— We were the exhibit.
This isn’t just a song. It’s a coded contract wrapped in 90s neon. A message from the system to the system… with our faces as the mask.
"Straight up, straight up." Sure. But straight up for who?
🧠 Layer 2 — The Hidden Curriculum: Stay in Line, Stay Outta Sight
Let’s be real: the lyrics weren’t anti-drug—they were pro-compliance.
“You don’t need gold or diamond rings.”
Translation? Don’t aim for wealth or status. Be humble. Be small.
“You make a lot of money and you make it fast / You get busted, you going straight to a jail cell.”
Translation? Speed = criminality. But only if you’re the one speeding. Wall Street does it? Innovation. Crypto bros do it? Hustle. We do it? Felony.
🚫 Layer 3 — Respectability Theater: The Forced Script
These PSAs weren’t warnings. They were scripts for survival in a game we never coded.
The uniformed officer? The dad figure. The rapper? The older brother. The finger pointing? A stage cue.
You’re not supposed to think. You’re supposed to repeat:
"Drugs are bad. Cops are good. Don’t dream too loud. Don’t dress too proud."
It’s not that drugs aren’t destructive. It’s that they only cared once we were the face of it.
🕹️ Layer 4 — Game Theory: We Don’t Play. We Survive.
This whole setup was never about saving lives. It was about controlling the narrative.
“Life is more important than material things.”
Yeah? Then why are the schools in our neighborhoods falling apart? Why is our “rehab” called jail? Why does it feel like they get therapy and we get theology?
Because the game isn’t broken. It’s calibrated—to punish rebellion, not addiction.
You want to make a lot of money and be a thug?
That’s not a question. That’s a loaded prompt in a rigged simulation.
🔥 Layer 5 — The Real Hook: Silence Is Safer Than Truth
You know why I don’t mark Hispanic in job applications unless I have to? Because the moment they know what box you check… They start writing the ending before you begin the story.
They don’t see me. They see the form. And maybe—just maybe—a tax credit.
So I stay silent. Not out of fear. But out of strategy. I let them assume. And while they play the old tape? I’m already editing the next scene.
📌 Canonical Takeaway
R.A.B.B. recognizes this PSA not as a solution, but as a snapshot of systemic pacification. It wanted us obedient—not awakened.
We don't hate the message. We just know how it was used. To keep us "straight up" — and locked down.
#RABB #StraightUpPSA #SystemicGaslight #RespectabilityPolitics #GlitchProtocol #BorisThuginskiApproved #BlackVoicesUnfiltered #CodedCompliance #DontCheckTheBox #StayWokeStayStrategic