Yes, there is a connection somewhat but not a direct one. Some of you guys are guilty of what many would do to us(gun owners). Placing all of a group of people into one broad genre that doesn't quite work(all gun owners are nuts.....all rappers are criminals).The way this thread is written you might as well say ,"Does Music Cause Violence?". Jsandi and snacktrack I am ashamed to see you guys take this thread there.... 
. Maybe I missed something but don't little white kids go to "mosh pits" and brag about beating each other up as part of the show? So what is the point. Violent music (can) be connected to violence in youth.....duh.but not directly. If you don't like it don't let your kids listen to it but don't try to blame the fall of society on 50 cent or eminem or marilyn manson or Korn(death metal group the k is backwards).... .A paraphrase of an eminem statment said something to the effect of parents get mad at him for saying what he says when he never asked to raise their kids in the first place..... So I guess snack track and Jsandi want the government to step in and set those rappers straight on what they can and can't say the government could "interpret" the 1st to only apply to government speak and limit open public media Either rap is not as violent as you say or this problem(rap causing violence) is not as wide spread as you want us to believe. 
, I like kennyb's answer, and Jsand with those statistics I am in favor of just getting rid of all the Black people and thusly getting rid of all the crime 
What "gangster rap" does do however is re-enforce the stereo types/life style/culture that these people choose to embrace......No person of normal intelligence has ever been influenced by a game or a song to do something violent that they would not normally do(ie in their nature).......period! Try to blame what you want but I am going to call this argument what I think it is.......a liberal argument with no real facts to back it up :barf: Trouble is if you're poor and you sell turnip greens from a pickup truck on the side of the road or set up a car wash in the front yard the next thing you see is a big ticket for operating a business without a license or violating the zoning laws or some similar rule whose goal is to keep you a nonproductive consumer.
Ask Bill Cosby. He dared make a public statement that the black community as a whole was letting down its youth and was nearly crucified for it. The abandonment of poor blacks by their better-off brothers is the Emperor's new clothes of postindustrial America. Personally I think that some of the racial stereotyping problem is related to the fact that for the most part poor blacks have gravitated to the high density inner cities and poor whites to the countryiside and small towns, while well to do blacks and whites hide out in the suburbs.