Raising a Daughter in a Hip Hop World
Walter Deller Most female rappers feel the need to use hypersexuality to be marketable, painting a new stereotype for young fans. "Guys wanna wife me and give me the ring/I'll do it anywhere, anyhow, I'm down for anything…" — Lil' Kim, featuring 50 Cent, "Magic Stick" So, I'm stuck in traffic and having this…
Cover Story: Apparel in Peril
"The summer sale at Sears is here! Clothing on sale to up to 40 percent. Save on men's and women's clothes, and buy summer outfits for the kids. But you better hurry! Sale ends soon." Twice that commercial has come on today. My mom talks about my family going, and I know what that means.…
Works of Art(Works)
Society rarely consults youth culture except to blame them. I linked with ArtWorks a few years back to shadow poet and actor Saul Williams when he came here to lead ArtWorks' apprentices in workshops. The following summer jessica Care moore, Williams' publisher/fellow slam poet and slam survivor, was commissioned to lead a new group of…
Cover Story: Are You Connected?
Learn how to breakdance and shop for slacks in Samoa, all while chomping chicken in your mama's kitchen watching Free Willy on the wayside. The Internet is more than a capability — it's lifestyle. It's taking night classes in Taiwan while buying socks in Tibet. A technological oxymoron, the Internet is global. It's universal. You…
Eric Fingerhut Is No Jerry Springer — Seriously
In Washington, the president sells a tax cut as the fast solution to a cyclical economic downturn. He sells a supposedly weeks-long occupation of Iraq as an antidote to terrorism. In Columbus, lawmakers quickly create vouchers and charter schools to side-step Ohio's shamefully inadequate public schools, which could take decades to fix. Responding to…
Diner: Fast Food, Slow Food
The location couldn't be more perfectly suited to the concept. "Quick-and-casual" is the booming restaurant genre that is several steps above burger and taco drive-thrus. The shopping mecca of Mason-Montgomery and Fields-Ertel roads exemplifies the formulaic, overscheduled and hurried, instant-gratification lifestyle that many of us have bought into, chain-store squared. The latest to join the…
Whirlygig: 95: Out on the Town
Pipe Dreams During dinner with Cathy and our mutual friends Keith and Sue at Boswell Alley in Northside on Friday, the girls and I decided to go on the Downtown Tour of Living on Sunday. Keith decided not to go since he dedicates his free Sundays in the fall to the NFL. Living in Cincinnati…
Pianist Jonathan Biss brings bliss to Mendelssohn String Quartet
The Cincinnati Chamber Music Society opens its 74th season on Sept. 30 with a concert by the MENDELSSOHN STRING QUARTET and pianist JONATHON BISS. The quartet, which is based at the North Carolina School of the Arts, tours extensively — they stopped in Cincinnati for a memorable program in 1997. Biss is developing a national…
Cover Story: American Idle?
Big Brother is on the border of being boarded out of the house by the newest Jack hero-ass on the Road Rules. He's not exactly Mr. Personality, but this is the Real World. Realities become a Fear Factor streaming non-fiction to your homes one Osbourne at a time. From Anna Nicole to Jackass, I admittedly…
Touchy-Feely Crap in Action
City Council candidate Brian Garry led a rally against corporate welfare outside of City Hall while council passed funding for a new Kroger garage downtown. Consultant and recent CityBeat cover story subject Peter Block (Peter's Principles, issue of Sept. 3-9) put his rhetoric and a dry sense of humor to work by engaging the…
Cover Story: Cincinnati’s Generation Vexed
Ramsey Ford (center above) works in the Cincinnati Art Museum space with two of the Editorial Ink apprentices, Miles Wolfley (left) and Adriel Johnson. Dean Gollar (opposite page) gets inspired by Thom Shaw (background). You can see a lot of our city from the third floor galleries in the Cincinnati Art Museum — the…
Travel & Getaways
Getaways OUR READERS LOVE to travel! And, with one simple phone call, you can reach up to 17 million adventurous, travel connoisseurs in 100+ newspapers just like this one. Go to www.aancan.com or call this newspaper for more information. (AAN CAN) World Travel CHINA TRAVEL SPECIALS Beijing 5-day/only $198! China 12-day highlight $848! 14-day Yangtze…
Cover Story: Cops in the House
This episode was so close to home it was in my backyard. Khaki shorts and sandals. Casual picnic. Yet, I was on edge. Take a man in uniform out of uniform, and he's just a man. Sitting next to me, no gun, no badge, but there. I flinched at the first mention of police that…
Woman looks to unleash her bestiality past and move forward
Between the ages of 13 and 16, I engaged in bestiality with our household pets. I was a horny kid and I guess kind of a freak. It never went beyond oral copulation, and I eventually curtailed the whole thing due to guilt and shame. I'm now a 21-year-old woman who is moving toward a…
News: Disorder in the Court
Jymi Bolden The unofficial motto at Hamilton County Municipal Court is "Hurry Up and Wait." To the unfamiliar, a brush with Hamilton County Municipal Court can be wizening. Here's a little taste. First off, if you've been held overnight, you'll find yourself appearing before a judge at what is called an arraignment — the…
Writer’s Block
We've seen the color of fright and that color is Wred: Dr. Wred Fright will read from his serialized novel at The Perpetual Motion Roadshow. Maybe I'm just inspired after watching the debut of HBO's Carnivale, a mysterious series about a traveling band of sideshow freaks, but in Cincinnati's literary world something deliciously wicked…
Locals Only: : College Rock
In the pioneering days of "Alternative" music, university communities were essential. So much so that bands from R.E.M. to The Smiths were lumped into a genre dubbed "College Rock." Areas like Chapel Hill, N.C., and Athens, Ga., were routinely producing enough quality bands to nudge the press into calling them the next big hotbed of…
Cover Story: What’s on Your Tray?
Cincinnati Public Schools (CPS) have been left out in the rain for way too long. Not all Cincinnati schools — just the urban ones. The lunches differ the most. Wyoming High School is served Caesar rolls, popcorn chicken and ice cream. Sometimes they have Montgomery Inn Day, when they're lavished with hot, juicy, delicious chicken…
Cover Story: The Trail of Tears: From the Streets to the Sewers
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! That's the relentless sound belched out from a car driving past. You could still hear it as I rode down the streets of Avondale. But there was something more noticeable than just the noise. Trash was all over the place. Ranging from potato chip bags to dirty diapers, from nappy weaves…
News: Stopping the WTO Again
Joshua C. Robinson It wouldn't be a proper World Trade Organization meeting without streetdemonstrations (below) and oppressive police crackdowns (above).Cancun complied, and then some. CANCUN, MEXICO — Women in bikinis are common at this beach resort, but visitors last week might have been surprised to see some of them marching through the streets wearing…
Cover Story: Attitude Adjustment
Although the Supreme Court has already ruled the anti-sodomy laws unconstitutional due to the recent decision in Lawrence vs. Texas, we Americans need to update our attitudes and allow them to reshape to the new ideas of the age we live in. Yes, sodomy is different, but when did we start punishing people for being…
