nothin Eminem: Role Model? | New Haven Independent

Eminem: Role Model?

Melinda Tuhus Photo

Simone Ngangi

Jersey Shore’s Snooki? Bad news. Eminem, circa 2010? Inspiring.

That’s how a group of 14 ninth-graders from area high schools weighed in on cultural icons promoted in the media.

The conversation, facilitated by three adults, was taped last week at Co-op High School for later broadcast on Twenty-first Century Conversations, which runs on local public access television. Click here for a schedule for when the program will air on area stations.

The teens, from Co-op, High School in the Community, West Haven High and Hamden High, over and over distinguished between what they called good role models and bad role models. Bad” in many cases meant fake” or superficial.”

One participant said not all the players on the reality show Jersey Shore are even from New Jersey. Colette Kroop (pictured above on left with Janet Zheng) said her family watched the show one time before taking a trip to the shore of New Jersey,” but got an on-the-ground reality” check when they found that many residents are deeply offended by it.

Conversations” host and producer N’Zinga Shani said she was pleased that the students understood programs like Jersey Shore are edited to get rid of the boring parts,” as one student put it, and to maximize sex and conflict. Even though they panned the show, they knew it was popular and many of them admitted watching it and similar shows. People get caught up in the drama,” one girl said.

As for Eminem, these young people were not past kindergarten when Marshall Mather spewed some of his most misogynistic lines. (They were unfamiliar with the word misogynist” but they understood it meant anti-female.) He took a break from music from 2005 to 2008. Now that he has daughters of his own, the students said, his work is more positive, even sensitive. Simone Ngangi (pictured at top of story) said that Eminem singing a duet with violence survivor Rihanna about domestic violence shows you can recover from it,” and that was a positive message.

Facilitator Enola Aird asked the teens how many hours a day they interact with all media — television, radio, Internet, phones. The estimates kept rising: four…eight… 12 hours, until someone said, most of the day,” and everyone agreed.

Then Aird asked how much time they spend with their parents daily, and everybody laughed. The consensus: not much.

Some kids said their parents limit what and how much they could watch shows on TV or the Internet. Kayla Linn (pictured after the taping in the middle with her mom on the left and Shani on the right) said, I went to camp and my parents said no electronics.’ I didn’t cheat, but by the end I was dying.”

Asked how many would like to cut down on TV, only Vijor McCray (pictured) raised her hand. She first estimated she watches 10 hours a day, then wasn’t sure that was accurate, but said it’s still a lot. I read when I have to and watch TV when I want to,” she said.

The group consensus was that only about 10 percent of what they watch can be considered educational.” Shani asked them if they would watch the show they were taping — the one they were in. They thought not. The media is always showing negative images of young people,” she concluded, and this is an opportunity to watch a group of young teens having a thoughtful conversation about issues of importance to them. I encourage you to watch public television,” she said. Then they could be their own role models.

Note: 21st Century Conversations” won an award last week for another program it put on this year, Affordable Health Care — A Human Right in 21st Century USA.” The program took second-place honors in the Northeast Regional Media Alliance Video Competition.

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