After Snoop Dogg was acquitted of murder charges on February 20, 1996, he and the mother of his son and their kennel of 20 pit bulls moved into a 5,000-square-foot (460 m2) home in the hills of Claremont, California…

Sort of sums it up.

Back on topic, I do like ‘fit as a butcher’s dog’.

And I know (as a 51 year old single female who’s had her moments) working in the NHS currently but has a history in the media, and worked in the picture libraries for several tabloid newspapers, it still worried me that you should perpetuate that image.

Thank you for your replies. My worst fear was that I would be ignored and that you (Worm, Brit, Mr Slang) would not even enter into a debate, in which case I could comfortably consign the whole lot of you to a middle-aged middle class exclusively male dustbin (on the other hand, that’s not a bad place to be!). I do have a sense of humour about stuff and it was just painful to have to make a protest. I accept what both of you have said – and yes,the whole rap culture is problematic e.g. my brother will play Eminem in the car, but I object because his children are in the back and I don’t think they should hear the f-word quite so much, and I know that rap is a valid culter in lots of ways (although I realise I’ve just used the world ‘valid’ which is so loaded, but you know what I mean).

Like a lot of things it’s an artistic expression for good or ill. (blimey, i’ve just heard Philip Hensher and Tom Sutcliffe on Radio 4 discussing Fiona Shaw’s version of The Ancient Mariner in the tunnels below the Old Vic – vanity project or what? – which interests to the same degree. So I have no real issues about aspects of modern culture being discussed on the Dabbler site- the more the merrier. And origins of slang is interesting and bound to feature some stuff which you may not want to discuss at the Ambassador’s dinner party (although, having worked for 3 Ambassadors I’m not sure, but I digress).

Even given all this, I still think it’s a horrible picture and I would just prefer not to have seen it, but that’s a risk of anyone who logs on to the internet – and now, it seems this site.

but there you go, and that’s all about it, as they say somewhere.

jane

p.s. Brit- I notice you way ‘will I be removing it?’ – I never asked that of you and I wouldn’t expect you to.

p.p.s. it may well be ‘in the mainstream’ – it’s still horrible.

Is it sexist? Indubitably, and seems to me to follow in a tradition of ‘randy dog’ cartoons, such as the Loony Tunes wolf who would go through an extraordinary eye-popping, heart-throbbing, panting routine whenever Bugs Bunny dressed as a sexy girl rabbit.

Will I be removing it? No, since Mr Slang’s posts neither condone nor condemn but report, the illustration likewise.

Jane: This may not assuage your feelings, which I naturally regret, but my assumption is that you don’t recognise the pic. It is the cover of the rapper Snoop Dogg’s (then Snoop Doggy Dogg, now Snoop Lion) album Doggystyle (1993, details here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggystyle). This title was of course a pun, and the lyrics are, as might be expected, even more ‘vulgar and horrible’: the whole self-glorifying macho mess of sex, drugs, violence and misogyny that was embodied in the category ‘gangsta rap’. The lyrics are also dense with slang. From my point of view it seems to work: my text deals, after all, with ‘bad’ dogs (and includes a number of sexual terms) rather than cute mutts. None of which will minimise your distaste, but it might set the pic in context.

I am shocked and genuinely taken aback that you allowed this to be put up here. Honestly. I am so disappointed.

or am I overreacting? I would be interested to hear what people think. I’m just talking about the picture, not Jonathon’s article.

loving your work as always, just not the pic on this occasion.