Actually no I didn’t grow up in a pre-dominantly white neighborhood, nor did I grow up in a house hold with a mother that played nothing but 80’s rock..Quite opposite actually being that I grew up in a very religious house hold (Christian) so the music that I was surrounded with was strictly Gospel…and the Hip/Hop and RnB was secular music that could get you sent to hell…I listened to Hip/Hop, Rnb, and Rap all the way to my first year in the Marine Corps until I stopped listening completely minus a couple of songs here and there…But it’s not who I grew around, which I will agree we reflect who, what, and when we grew up, but with me I simply loved reading books and watching Adventure movies which also had a part in turning my interest in opposite directions…I can also remember on Saturdays and Sundays when there was nothing else on Television because I didn’t have cable all they played was 80’s movies and with that you get 80’s music….It was a real slow transition it started with one band, then another, then with a movie that had a song I liked, and so on and so on until I knew it I like 80’s Heavy Metal, 80’s Rock, 80’s Pop more than anything else…I remember my first time my mother picked me up she really noticed after all we listened to was “The Scorpions- Love at First Sting, Shine down-The Sound of Madness, and Phil Collins’ Greatest Hits”….I mean it wasn’t intended it just so happened that as I grew older I just began to appreciate a different style of music...I mean call me  “Ignorant” but if you want to live a certain lifestyle then you have follow the steps that people who live that lifestyle have already taken forgive me if most of those pretty much all those people are white…Like I said the media whether Television, Magazine Articles,  and the Radio they have virtually the most influence, and what I see and hear pretty much shapes and influences my decisions on fashion, musical preference, career, women, and I think you get the point…