
Content Analysis of How Courts Use and Misuse Rap Lyrics in Criminal Cases - bookofjoe
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3369175
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toper-centage
This almost sounds like something out of The Onion. How can lyrics of a song,
something - by definition - made up, be useful or acceptable as evidence?

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paggle
In no US jurisdiction are you allowed to cut out someone's heart and store it
under your floor. You're also not allowed to threaten someone that you'll do
this to them, or incite others to do the same. You're not allowed to get on a
street corner and say "The time has come to find Bob Jones, drag him out of
his house, and cut his heart out of his chest."

You are, however, allowed in all jurisdictions to write a story like Edgar
Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" where the narrator does the same.

The question that arises in rap music is, when the rapper says, "Imma kill Bob
Jones and cut his heart out his chest," is it more like the former or the
latter? Is the "I" the rapper, or like Poe's narrator? It's a hard question
for the law, because yes, the distinction between a novelist and a rapper is
deeply tied into structural discrimination along lines of race and class, but
also there are many more rappers than novelists who become the perpetrators
and victims of violent deaths.

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x86_64Ubuntu
Where are all the free-speech zealots from the "CloudFlare shuts down 8chan"
thread?

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bluntfang
hacker news is a bubble of mostly middle class white male libertarians. what
would you expect?

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s_y_n_t_a_x
Liberals, yes. Libertarians, haha no.

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bluntfang
there's too many "choose to leave your job" posts that get upvoted for there
not to be a libertarian majority.

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rolltiide
so basically prosecutors are using rap lyrics as evidence when convenient to
obtain a conviction (which the judge allows), and actively fighting in not
allowing use of rap lyrics when the defendant offers it as exculpatory
evidence as it might hurt the prosecutor's ability to obtain a conviction
(which the judge allows)

these incentives are all messed up.

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arvidkahl
Key & Peele made a very entertaining song about this at
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14WE3A0PwVs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14WE3A0PwVs)

I always found it funny yet somewhat disturbing, and the paper makes it more
real than I can comfortably handle.

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uxp100
Another song related to this is "Rap Snitch Knishes" by MF DOOM.

