He’s a Rat, turncoat, stool pigeon, snake, Benedict Arnold, Judas, informant, tattletale, nark, deep throat, whistle blower, double-crosser, and blabbermouth. All to describe one thing snitch, they say ‘snitches get stitches’ or ‘snitches are bitches that get stitches’, well what exactly is snitching? Is snitching when you witness a crime and you tell the police what happen or is it when a person does a crime with an accomplice, and being just as guilty, saves themselves while their partner takes the blame?
In the last two months there have been cases where people reacted toward a so called snitch and in another case people did nothing in fear of being labeled a snitch. Let’s examine the case of the Richmond High School gang rape, a young women was brutally raped, robbed and beaten by multiple attackers on school grounds and in fear of being labeled snitches no one helped her and no one called the police, one of the witness’ said ‘I feel like I could have done something but I don’t feel like I have any responsibility for anything that happened’ sorry but if you witnessed a rape and a beaten you do have a responsibility to save someone who is defenseless and helpless. The thing is it took 18-year-old Margarita Vargas, who wasn’t even at the scene of the crime, and undaunted by pressure to keep quiet, to call the police. Vargas told reporters it was the right thing to do and she wasn’t afraid and she doesn’t adhere to the culture of silence. Now in this case was Margarita a snitch or someone doing the right thing because a wrong had been done?
This movement of ‘NO SNITCHING’ is something that is deep rooted in the hip-hop mainstream to the point where rappers have brought it to the forefront. Case and point; on February 5, 2006 an altercation broke out on a Busta Rhymes video shoot which left his friend and long time bodyguard Israel Ramirez shot dead. Now Bussa Buss is a potential witness in the shooting death of his bodyguard Israel Ramirez and at the time would not cooperate with the police. And that’s where the line of snitching becomes blurred, is even talking to the police snitching? Is giving the police information that can put a criminal in jail snitching? In an interview with 60 Minutes Anderson Cooper asked rapper Cam’ron about snitching watch what he said:
