I watched the Rock Docs: NWA: The World’s Most Dangerous Group documentary about NWA last night. Surprisingly, it made me think and actually somewhat changed my view on some things, most notably Ice Cube. I know, if something on VH1 made me think, apparently intentionally, then WTF is up with the universe?

I loathed Ice Cube the first time I heard his solo music. I first heard it at a time when the hip hop industry was working overtime at making it acceptable for white people to buy rap albums. Longtime Blue Blood readers may recall an article I wrote for the print magazine about my love of Ice T, which I called “I Shot the Sheriff and the Deputy”. (I’m a witty girl.) But the first stuff I heard by Ice Cube was not about the things I could relate to in an Ice T record. If there was anything about rage, disenfranchisement, and reaching for power on there, it was most definitely not for me. Ice Cube went on and on and on about how much white people overall suck and Asian people are this and Jewish people are this and white women are all ugly and blah blah blah. Apart from the deliberately alienating lyrics, this was also a time when rappers didn’t really tend to be that good-looking. Music television was around and MTV was instrumental in popularizing NWA, but let’s just say Ice Cube didn’t really have the good looks of LL Cool J, Nelly, or 50 Cent. Ice Cube looked like the pissed off guy who, if you had a party at your house, would get drunk and start breaking stuff as soon as his friends started having fun or getting laid. Like he should talk about what anybody else looks like. Hmph.

Then, at some point, Ice Cube appeared to have had politician-level quantities of Botox injected into his head and he started appearing in family-friendly comedies. I thought that maybe the deities of irony think that’s funny. But Ice Cube was appearing in exactly the kind of movies which are offensively wholesome. I’m not opposed to wholesome, but I am opposed to the kind of wholesome which makes you believe someone is just hiding most of who they really are. I am opposed to the kind of wholesome which is intended to make regular people feel terrible about themselves. And I thought Ice Cube was, by now, not only a racist misogynist, but a sell-out racist misogynist tool of the overculture.

Watching this VH1 special made me rethink my opinion that NWA was really just an example of Dr. Dre being great and taking a few guys from his neighborhood with him, folks who were just in the right place at the right time with the right friend. Taking nothing away from Dr. Dre’s brilliance, NWA may have been able to be what it was for more of a group synergy than I would previously have credited. Notably, Ice Cube actually wrote a number of raps, but I’ve never seen press coverage of the group talk about that before.

I can see why Ice Cube might have furrowed his brow like that, if he wrote some of NWA’s angriest words and then he saw Eazy-E being all about grabbing all the dough and having sex with as many groupies as possible. And he saw his bandmates settling into making something he saw as important and political into a business. As the seed money for the band and the studio they recorded in came from Eazy-E and much of the band’s street cred came from Eazy-E, he probably deserved a bigger slice of the money pie and, if he was more of a hit with the ladies than the others, maybe he was just plain sexier. He was certainly hotter than Ice Cube. And Eazy-E did die of AIDS from having so much random unprotected sex, so not that there wasn’t, ya know, a downside to being attractive that way.

Knowing that Dr. Dre went on to tap talents including Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and 50 Cent, I just kinda thought he was the brains of the operation. I’m not sure what MC Ren went on to, besides a few solo efforts, at least one of which did very well. DJ Yella went on to direct for mainstream adult video companies. I obviously believe that porn can be political, but calling a gonzo porn series DJ Yella’s Str8 Outta Compton really seems to show a certain willingness to overlook the importance, strength, and pride of NWA’s Straight Outta Compton record.

I feel a certain sympathy and understanding for Ice Cube now, that I did not before. If those words were his and he truly believed in what NWA had to say and changing the world and it was not about the money or the groupies, then it must have been gut-wrenching for him when those around him started talking like it was just business. I don’t know what year he legally changed his name to be Ice Cube, but it seems like he really wanted to be that guy, not just play a character to sell stuff.

On one level, I’m pleased that the internet facilitated the financial viability of my previously costly art project for my scene and community. Money can facilitate freedom and I like freedom. But money can be a really polluting influence as well, one which really brings out the wolves. I know I find it gut-wrenching when I hear “just business” from my peers and compatriots, some of whom are (or at least were) people I deeply believed in. There are people, I would have considered members of my tribe, who help a data mining corporation like Experian simultaneously strip mine our culture and destroy any remaining privacy or control over our lives we might have. There are people, I would have considered members of my tribe, who help a mainstream adult video corporation like Vivid recruit others I would have considered members of my tribe, while paying them far less than they would ever offer someone they considered a full-fledged member of society. There are people, I would have considered members of my tribe, who help a mainstream porn site like SuicideGirls turn once vital sexual and feminist activism into bickering competitions which would be unseemly even in junior high school girls. There are people, I would have considered members of my tribe, who help a mainstream clothing corporation like Hot Topic cheapen our style and make it something for children.

Maybe they have given up on true empowerment and feel like playing the clown is the only option left for them. If they can no longer recall what was supposed to be empowering about what they chose to do, then, in my opinion, they need to check themselves.

I’m not interested in being the court jester with the funny-colored hair in a disrespectful ruler’s kingdom. I’m thoroughly capable of putting on an Izod and having a nice salon do something more natural. I was bad at golf the last time I played at my grandparents country club, before being banned for punk rock behavior. But I could learn. And I love to eat, so I am ahead of the curve in knowing which fork to use.

If I decide to switch things up, it will not be to play the Pied Piper in leading people to work for Experian for free (while giving away their personal data) or Vivid for less than standard wages. I absolutely reject the notion that I should accept second class citizen status because of how I like to have sex or my gender or what I like to wear or what I like to listen to or having an artistic temperament. There is no obvious word for the kind of disenfranchised I am. But I won’t accept working for a corporate master on lesser terms because of it, any more than Ice Cube would for the color of his skin or where he is from.

All I’m saying is that Ice Cube made a reported thirteen million dollars last year and I no longer begrudge him it.

The incredibly mild fame conferred by being on a reality show opens a person up for so much unpleasantness and, as near as I can ascertain, being on the show itself is a bummer. I know I used to be pretty responsive when television shows wanted to cover Blue Blood. I turned down Jenny Jones and all the talk show scum who asked me to tell everyone I was, like, totally a vampire and gawth is like, oh my goth, my life. But, even when I didn’t have cable or a TV with reception, Forrest Black and I both appeared on MTV, HBO, and FOX multiple times. I don’t know if it helps sales, but, as a journalist myself, I am reluctant to refuse someone access. At least I used to be. Now I regularly turn down television show producers who tell me how much they want to give Blue Blood exposure or how they plan to present a “positive spin” on my community. I used to believe some of the promises television people made, especially when I wrote them into our appearance contracts. I used to feel like being asked to appear on a show as an expert was a compliment. In a time when people have fleeting brushes with fame for defecating on Flavor Flav’s floor . . . well, who wants to be famous?

In my article Flavor Flav Has Hot Tub Love on VH1 but Ladies Best Be Nice Girls (who like threesomes) last year, I covered Flava Flav’s apparently hypocritical casting aside of Toastee, one of his supposed suitor chicks. For those just tuning in now, another supposed contestant on the show ratted Toastee out for appearing in Barely Legal and on “VHS”. At the time, my thought was that no one needed to worry about accidentally running across VHS video these days. Also probably no prob if the naughty pictures are engraved on the walls of a cave.

Apparently, some of y’all on the interwebs still watch movies on VHS because people kept finding my article on Toastee and her rumored VHS exploits. Either that or you were just optimistically figuring that this wonderful internet invention would provide the necessary conduit to seeing Toastee naked somehow. Now there have been a few artsy bloggers posting Halloween pictures of Toastee and the like, since the show. But leave it to the mainstream video tycoons at Vivid to put out a celeb sex tape released on both DVD and a web site.

The Vivid press release, among other things, stated the following:

The 23-year-old “Toastee” was born and raised in suburban Philadelphia and was a psychology major at Northeastern University. She appeared on the VH1 show “Charm School,” vying for the affections of rap artist Flavor Flav. She was bounced from the program after it was discovered that she had done nude modeling and appeared in a porn movie under the stage name “Natalia the Scissor Vixen” known for clamping men’s heads between her thighs. She has also been a guest on The Tyra Banks Show. “Toastee Exposed” was obtained from celebrity image broker David Hans Schmitt, who says “she may not have made the grade on VH1s ‘Charm School,’ but she gets straight as on this tape.”

Although I watched Flavor of Love up until Flav kicked Toastee off, I’ve never seen Charm School. VH1 describes the show saying:

Ever wonder what became of the girls that were so nasty, vicious and rough-around-the-edges that even Flavor Flav didn’t want them? What are those girls going to do? Where are those girls going to go? Luckily for them, VH1 had just the place to send them, a little place called – CHARM SCHOOL. Thirteen of your favorite breakout stars from “Flavor of Love” seasons one and two are back for some heated competition. Living as a group, learning as a group and out for themselves, these former Flavorettes will be rigorously trained in proper etiquette and manners before competing in challenges to determine their poise and grace under pressure.

So, uhm, it was FOL2, and not Charm School, that Toastee vied for Flav’s attention on, but I guess Vivid doesn’t have to watch reality television to have good distro for a celeb sex tape. After the Toastee debacle on FOL2, I did a little internet sleuthing and it seemed to me that the mistreated contestant was probably mostly a lesbian. Her MySpace lists her orientation as bi. I didn’t mention it because I felt like whether or not Toastee set off my gaydar was not relevant. I forgot that we are living in the age of paparazzi intrusion at most levels of life. My bad. Whatever the reason for her lack of interest, Toastee aka Jennifer Toof told Ronaldo Horacio Mexico at Hip Hop site SOHH that she wanted to meet Flav and wanted to be on television but had no actual romantic interest in the rapper. Furthermore, she didn’t think anyone else on the show, except possibly New York, had a lick of real attraction to Flav as their motivation for being there.

On her MySpace blog, after being on Charm School, Toof/Toastee posted:

Well, as you guys will find out in tonight’s episode, some people are so fake, and extremely selfish. VH1 tries to create drama between people, and it’s disgusting. Why do you think I didn’t say anything about fol2? Because I have a contract, I`m not allowed to say anything. This show is just some bullshit, and when you’re in a situation thats serious, you should never trust anybody.

Now, ignoring the part where calling the show bullshit and saying VH1 instigates the drama is probably already a violation of her contract, why would she agree to be on Charm School after being booted from FOL2? She might have been contractually obligated to do so. But the more important question is perhaps, why would an attractive (and flexible!) college graduate, with a medical school acceptance letter in her pocket, put herself through all this? Twice?

If the idea is that reality show participants are supposed to be presenting something vaguely real, only they are all just tormented souls who believe they don’t exist unless they are on the small screen, how real is that? More importantly, how real is anyone’s fifteen minutes then? Am I not noticing some goal these people have? What is the point of appearing on a supposedly real show where you, not only aren’t supposed to promote your projects, but are not supposed to be yourself? At least Charm School gives the winner $50,000, instead of a shot at a mean boyfriend like FOL. I used to fantasize about crossing through my TV screen into a fabulous music video. When the TV screen has a bunch of women feigning interest in some lame hypocrite womanizer, my real life is a lot more like a cool music video these days than anything presented in broadcast media.

I used to believe that fame was something which glittered alluringly like fairy dust and not something I’d need to wipe off my shoe.

I see it as, not only a given, but maybe even a goal that things I enjoy in a fringe environment will be picked up by the larger society. The problems come when the overculture, in the process of co-opting something cool, tries to destroy the naturally existing subculture and the people most dedicated to that culture, in order to replace it all with something more easily managed and controlled. The problems come when the marketing shifts from spin to bald-faced lies. The problems come when no one appreciates art without a backstory and the market becomes used to the perfection of fake backstory. It seems like modern press is often more comfortable presenting a tidy and wholly false PR tall tale than presenting something real and true. Part of the reason for this is that modern audiences are often more comfortable reading tidy and wholly false PR tall tales. Real life tends to be more complicated and harder to get your head around.

I could like Avril Lavigne if she were presented as essentially a cute blonde actress in a larger movie. Instead, her managers insult everyone’s intelligence by getting a stylist to put Avril in a Guns N’ Roses T-shirt and having her publicist tell the world the actress is inspired by David Bowie (but neglecting to tell the girl playing the precocious punk songstress role that Bowie does not rhyme with Maui.) Just try and find music magazine press presenting anything remotely true about the teamwork creation of Avril Lavigne. I don’t know if the magazines fear lack of access to stars their audiences want to read about or if they fear legal reprisals or if it is all just some sort of gentlemen’s agreement, but certain specific pieces of truth have more trouble getting out there as overculture chews up subculture.

I’ve been debating with myself whether or not to mention what got edited out of the most recent interview Eros Zine did with yours truly. I appreciate what Eros Zine does for a variety of scenes and I adore EZ’s editor Thomas Roche who did the interview. And I very much appreciate the support (and fun times!) both have given to both me and Blue Blood over the years. I’ve decided to mention part of what was expurgated because I feel like this one small piece was important. Before I do, however, I want to make it very clear that publications such as Rolling Stone and the LA Weekly, with presumably larger legal budgets, have also cut pieces about the world of supposed altporn apparently due to legal concerns. So it is not unusual that Eros Zine’s legal department insisted on cutting a number of comments. (I promised Thomas I would be clear that it was legal and not editorial who required the cuts.) Journalists always want to know my opinion about adult video and the so-called altporn sites I’m supposed to consider competitive. But apparently what I have to say is just too dangerous to actually print.

Assuming that Eros Zine’s lawyers are essentially sensible, I just want to post for posterity the portion which was cut which contained shoutouts to people who deserve some credit. The rest can remain on the cutting room floor for now.

Some of the directors who might object to the current shameless pretension that punk art porn was just invented are Gregory Dark, David Aaron Clark, Nick Zedd, Justice Howard, Michael Ninn, Antonio Passolini, Stephen Sayadian, Richard Kern, and I’m really just scratching the surface with that list. (VCA and Vivid will be trying to get them all under exclusive contract by this time tomorrow. If they want to thank me for the suggestions, they can send checks payable to Blue Blood at 8033 Sunset Blvd #4500, West Hollywood, CA 90046. Or show me some quality product. Screeners are accepted at that address as well. My mind is open and I’m still a journalist.)

I worried about being potentially helpful to outsider corporations by giving shoutouts to people who deserve them, but I decided that I wanted to take the high road because I think it makes one a better person to give credit where it is due. Unfortunately, the legal folks worried about my commentary on my concerns about said corporations using my shoutouts as free consulting.

The biggest challenge of having sort of imperialist types come into a community is, not just to keep them from pushing out the native peoples, but also to keep the native peoples from simply becoming assimilated by the invaders. I’m certainly not immune, although I guess I’ve got more of a rebel/revolutionary mentality than many. I don’t think anyone is immune. (I just came from visiting a Native American art history museum, so please forgive the analogies.) I’m not personally what anyone would consider left wing and I definitely don’t believe cashing a check from a large corporation is intrinsically bad.

Full disclosure: Hustler owns VCA. I’ve not only worked for Hustler, but I’ve stated in public and in writing on numerous occasions that I felt they were the best of the big adult publishing houses, all of which I have done projects for. Vivid does not, to the best of my knowledge, do magazines, so I’ve never worked with them, but there are plenty of photos floating around the net featuring yours truly drinking and eating with with people who work at both Hustler and Vivid. I really like some of those people and think they are good folks.

I’m not sure precisely where one ought to draw the line, but I definitely think it should be drawn before invaders get to assume control of our opportunities, re-write history, and take away our language. There is nothing wrong with doing a lucrative gig for a large corporation. So much the better if the gig is something fun and interesting. But there really ought to be some wiggle room between accepting some money and accepting total annihilation of one’s self-actualization, culture, and ideals. I guess I’m just an optimist.