Straight Outta Compton  directed by F. Gary Gray was had many and varied themes: police brutality, censorship, brotherhood, HIV/AIDS awareness, and the realities the rappers chronicle through their lyrics. Each of the people within the group had their backstories, and I think that the film did a good job of contextualizing each of the young men.

Moreover, the film did a fantastic job of implementing the issue of police brutality that was deeply entrenched within society  and was coming to the forefront in the 1980s. There was one scene where Ice Cube, one of the rappers was violently searched in front of his family for simply walking home. In another scene, the rappers are on break and police make them lay on the pavement and search them in a dehumanizing way.

Sadly, police brutality is still a systemic problem that permeates into today’s world decades later. By powerfully showing the issue of police brutality, I thought more on this issue. I also reflected on the United States prison system and criminal laws on a broader level.

This past winter break, while talking to my father about police brutality, one of the comments he made was that he finds the role of accessible video cameras very important, with something to the effect of “This has been a pertinent issue for a long time: racial profiling, police brutality, and even harsh sentencing imposed upon marginalized populations. As a criminal defense attorney there were definitely times I felt powerless defending my clients against the system. However, I think there is a lot of potential with people taking notice nowadays and people videotaping these incidents for themselves.”

In my eyes, there is a lot of potential in the movements that have arisen as a reaction to police brutality. #blacklivesmatter is one of the prominent, strong and vast movements that can not be ignored. Like many times in history, leaders within the movement realizes that there needs to be a sense of urgency to influence change, a very difficult task in a system that enforces itself.

Another issue we spoke about was the cradle to prison pipeline, in which marginalized communities are at a higher risk of facing imprisonment, which leads them from the cradle straight into prison. Even within prison there are pertinent issues that go unnoticed: solitary confinement, (which is sometimes used as punishment for small infractions and can fall under the category of “cruel and unusual punishment”), exploitative prison labor, poor handling of prisoners with mental health issues, and the list goes on. Our current prison system functions on the presumption that prison is a form of punishment as opposed to a form of rehabilitation. By making that assumption we are restricting society from potentially lowering recidivism rates which could benefit the public welfare substantially.

I was struck by this notion that the visibility of these issues has risen and fallen. I can not help but wonder how many people in the past have been subjected to the full force of the law for simply existing, their names that have been forgotten, and the fact that they will never see justice (police departments are not required to report deaths and statistics only represent estimates). I will never forget that this is a problem that persists today despite growing public knowledge, and I will always remember the names that have been subject to a racist system. It is absolutely frightening to know that basic fundamental rights only apply to a certain demographic.

The lyrics that N.W.A rapped capture an issue that was rampant in the 1980s, and is clearly still prominent today. The release of this film comes at a time when there is a growing consciousness to the issue of police brutality, which provided for a powerful film.