My little sister, Tupac, Pumpkins, and discrimination... I need your help..
- Thread starter DrugBa11ad
- Start date
Drug Ba11ad... I think there's a lot of stuff that you just need to let go of. While I'm just as much of a Pac fan--and in a few cases, more so--as the next forum member, my admiration for Pac doesn't exaggerate who he was as a person.
Pac was influential, but it's not like he changed the world. He was an intelligent, talented man who did a lot of good things, but it's not like he cleaned up the ghettos and put minorities on the same playing field as the upper-class white Americans. He had a lot of great ideas that definitely would've made life better for a lot of people, especially those in the lower income bracket, but none of those things materialized.
As far as the good things that Pac did for the community, there were a few (randomly giving money to beggers and visiting kids in hospitals) but not enough to make a strong argument. A lot of Pac's best ideas either never happened or started but didn't take off. Examples? His idea to have rappers sponsor Pop Warner football teams and Little League baseball teams composed of good students was just what a lot of cities needed, but they never happened. Blame it on Pac's untimely death if you want, but it's not something that required years to plan. And the whole thing about him "sitting across from all the candidates at the next election" was just wishful thinking.
And let's not forget about all of the bad stuff. Pac was a guy who talked about ending black-on-black violence, saying "win or lose/ red or blue/ we must all stay true," but he got shot over throwing the first punches at a Crip. If you were in California in 1996, you'd understand the power that Pac had. While nobody was really "riding" on the East Coast, A LOT of us were all on the "Fuck Bad Boy and whoever else" bandwagon solely because of Pac. And it's not because we didn't know any better or out of ignorance, Pac had that powerful of a voice, and while he realized the error in his ways later on (hence the One Nation album), none of us got to hear it or watch the drama blow over, and as soon as Pac died, a lot of us had it in our minds that it was still on. The sad thing is, I was almost expecting (but not hoping) that Biggie would get murdered in a matter of months, and he did.
So in the end, I agree that your sister's teacher was probably a bit narrow-minded about Pac, but at the same time, that individual is only responsible for getting across the school's curriculum, and I feel that the teacher had every right to question Pac, but not to that level of seriousness (considering it's just a jack-o-lantern). While I see your point about Elvis and Marilyn Monroe, they're at least historical figures, whereas Pac is just a charismatic, talented black man with perhaps the most influential voice ever in hip-hop--for now. Maybe one day that will change, and he will be a more important part of music history. But all I know, is that after all those years of public school and five years of college, I have only had one textbook that ever mentioned "Tupac Shakur" (not counting the ones from my Sociology of Hip Hop course). While others underrate Pac as an artist, that doesn't mean that every fan of his can overrate him and call him some sort of revolutionary who changed the world. Just think back to Chris Rock from his Bigger & Blacker DVD:
"People always make shit bigger than it really is. People saying 'Tupac Shakur was struck down by assassins' bullets.' 'Biggie Smalls was assassinated.' No they wasn't! Martin Luther King was assassinated. Malcolm X was assassinated. John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Them two niggas got shot. I love Tupac, I love Biggie, but school will be open on they birthday."
Pac was influential, but it's not like he changed the world. He was an intelligent, talented man who did a lot of good things, but it's not like he cleaned up the ghettos and put minorities on the same playing field as the upper-class white Americans. He had a lot of great ideas that definitely would've made life better for a lot of people, especially those in the lower income bracket, but none of those things materialized.
As far as the good things that Pac did for the community, there were a few (randomly giving money to beggers and visiting kids in hospitals) but not enough to make a strong argument. A lot of Pac's best ideas either never happened or started but didn't take off. Examples? His idea to have rappers sponsor Pop Warner football teams and Little League baseball teams composed of good students was just what a lot of cities needed, but they never happened. Blame it on Pac's untimely death if you want, but it's not something that required years to plan. And the whole thing about him "sitting across from all the candidates at the next election" was just wishful thinking.
And let's not forget about all of the bad stuff. Pac was a guy who talked about ending black-on-black violence, saying "win or lose/ red or blue/ we must all stay true," but he got shot over throwing the first punches at a Crip. If you were in California in 1996, you'd understand the power that Pac had. While nobody was really "riding" on the East Coast, A LOT of us were all on the "Fuck Bad Boy and whoever else" bandwagon solely because of Pac. And it's not because we didn't know any better or out of ignorance, Pac had that powerful of a voice, and while he realized the error in his ways later on (hence the One Nation album), none of us got to hear it or watch the drama blow over, and as soon as Pac died, a lot of us had it in our minds that it was still on. The sad thing is, I was almost expecting (but not hoping) that Biggie would get murdered in a matter of months, and he did.
So in the end, I agree that your sister's teacher was probably a bit narrow-minded about Pac, but at the same time, that individual is only responsible for getting across the school's curriculum, and I feel that the teacher had every right to question Pac, but not to that level of seriousness (considering it's just a jack-o-lantern). While I see your point about Elvis and Marilyn Monroe, they're at least historical figures, whereas Pac is just a charismatic, talented black man with perhaps the most influential voice ever in hip-hop--for now. Maybe one day that will change, and he will be a more important part of music history. But all I know, is that after all those years of public school and five years of college, I have only had one textbook that ever mentioned "Tupac Shakur" (not counting the ones from my Sociology of Hip Hop course). While others underrate Pac as an artist, that doesn't mean that every fan of his can overrate him and call him some sort of revolutionary who changed the world. Just think back to Chris Rock from his Bigger & Blacker DVD:
"People always make shit bigger than it really is. People saying 'Tupac Shakur was struck down by assassins' bullets.' 'Biggie Smalls was assassinated.' No they wasn't! Martin Luther King was assassinated. Malcolm X was assassinated. John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Them two niggas got shot. I love Tupac, I love Biggie, but school will be open on they birthday."
Dante said:
my last posts were rushed, and this one also is.
But, you obviously have not researched Fred Hampton or Huey Newton extensively have you? Both leading members of the Black Panther Party did in fact organize with white youth groups and other white radical groups, they believed in organizing against a "common" enemy.
How is my view of history skewed? The American education system teaches children a "whitewashed" view of history, and thats bullshit. I do not hate myself at all, I have nothing against the average white person, but I do have something against the collective white actions that have taken place over the years, the oppression and violence and murder and poverty brought out by whites and for that matter anyone else who has committed those crimes. Just because I believe in fighting for oppressed people I hate myself or white people?
You are the ignorant one, and feel sorry for my students all you want, but they will be getting much more of a reality then other students.
What the fuck are you even on about dude? You have no idea what your talking about.
double post
edit: might as well make this useful...
DeezNuts, although I do agree with some of your points, and disagree with others, you presented what you had to say in a rather respectful manner. You wern't a dick, and I appreciate that, and your post was rather helpful, and less condescending then Dante's. Thank you.
I would respond fully but I don't have the time at the moment.
edit: might as well make this useful...
DeezNuts, although I do agree with some of your points, and disagree with others, you presented what you had to say in a rather respectful manner. You wern't a dick, and I appreciate that, and your post was rather helpful, and less condescending then Dante's. Thank you.
I would respond fully but I don't have the time at the moment.
awe yes, this reminds me of a time when my little sister, who was going to a school where u had to wear uniforms...
once they had a free dress days and the theme was "CELEBRITY DAY"... so kids got to dres up like their favorite celebrities and whatnot... she was mentioning how people had on sports jerseys, some girls dressed up like their favorite pop stars, brocolli spears or whoever else, one teacher had on a beattles shirt, one boy had a bob marley shirt, another boy had a scarface shirt on, and she had on a Tupac shirt... and guess who had to turn their shirt inside out...
this was what she just said via AIM:
"I wore it and mr.c said I couldn't because he's a bad influence and he was a gang member and all that and then I argued with him and telling him something like you look on the negative side of someone and then I started to debate. and then I told him how pac wrote poems and how he was involved in his government.. and then mr.c told me if I could write a page an essay about it then he'll allow it."
So tupac was a real life thug gangster and bad influence, while Scarface is a fictional movie character that slanged yayo and killed many men...
Dont they read The Rose that Grew From Concrete for summer reading? shit... at University of Washington they have a class called the "textual appeal of Tupac Shakur"
once they had a free dress days and the theme was "CELEBRITY DAY"... so kids got to dres up like their favorite celebrities and whatnot... she was mentioning how people had on sports jerseys, some girls dressed up like their favorite pop stars, brocolli spears or whoever else, one teacher had on a beattles shirt, one boy had a bob marley shirt, another boy had a scarface shirt on, and she had on a Tupac shirt... and guess who had to turn their shirt inside out...
this was what she just said via AIM:
"I wore it and mr.c said I couldn't because he's a bad influence and he was a gang member and all that and then I argued with him and telling him something like you look on the negative side of someone and then I started to debate. and then I told him how pac wrote poems and how he was involved in his government.. and then mr.c told me if I could write a page an essay about it then he'll allow it."
So tupac was a real life thug gangster and bad influence, while Scarface is a fictional movie character that slanged yayo and killed many men...
Dont they read The Rose that Grew From Concrete for summer reading? shit... at University of Washington they have a class called the "textual appeal of Tupac Shakur"
Dante
Meyer & Dante Best Friends4eva
i'll pick apart one part of your post that reeked of ignorance, and use that as an illustration of my point...DrugBa11ad said:
so you don't admire christopher columbus because he employed the use of slaves to achieve his goal... for that act alone you undermine his achievement and its incredible impact on the history of the planet from our euro-spective vantage, eh? that white devil took advantage of the poor north and central africans and forced them to do his bidding without any recognition or honor. big frowny emoticon.
as someone who has the ambition to become an educator and who has the audacity to try to school me on issues he has an merely a superficial and ideological perspective on, i have to correct you. christopher columbus employed the use of slaves because that was standard practice for that period of time. in fact, to criminalize him because there were no sweeping movements of social reform at that time is laughable. do you discount the achievements of egypt because they also relied upon slave labor? how about the aztecs? what about timbuktu? whoa, you mean africans actually enslaved other africans? what's the world coming to?
my point is that you seem to have a white devil skew on history that is just as racist as those who blindly hate minorities. the converse of self hate or even a generic and faceless benefit of the doubt it just as racist and damaging as calling someone a racial epitaph to their face.
you mention the panthers at several turns. at 18 years old i can make a pretty sound wager that you have no direct experience with members of that group beyond the mental construct you have painted for yourself. fair enough, but you may find that while some of their leaders were welcoming to white participants and sympathizers, most members were not so friendly. i'm not making generalizations, but you seem to demonstrate the same mentality of "we're all one so hence we are a united front." that blind allegiance and affinity would serve you poorly. be happy you live in 2006 with that mentality and not 1966.
finally, to touch back on the foolishness that started this topic, my friend deeez summarized my perspective. face the fact that 2pac, while a charismatic and interesting person, was still on his upward path and had not yet taken an active role in creating social change. short of handing money and turkeys out no one seems to be able to demonstrate that he made the sainthood changes you seem to idolize him for. again, i'm one of the biggest pac fans in the world, but i'm also a realist. pac was a voicebox - not an activist. praising jesse, martin, and even louis would be more benefitting than over emphasizing the commentaries of a rapper.
yes, elvis and marilyn were not changers of the american perspective, but you're again discounting their historical roles (because they're white?). the reverence of these individuals is a function of time and the populations they represented and intermingled with. 2pac will rise to increasing levels of public recognition in time as his impact spreads to generations and as our generations mature, but the simple fact that he is a hip hop artist functions as a delay. perhaps in your white hatred you failed to consider that hip hop (in the golden era) was the voice of black people for black people and their peers across ethnicity. white kids bought it, but the reality was that it was mainly constructed for members of minority groups. it stands to reason that an average (white?) teacher in ohio doesn't have the same grasp of his themes as we do.
now then, i have to ask you the hard question. was the choice for this project about your own pursuits or your sister's? it seems to me that she likely would not fully understand the political themes and names 2pac uses (she's in 5th grade), nor how his words are a commentary of some significantly volatile time periods of the 90s. that being said, don't you think that you are cheating her out of her own learning process by force feeding her one of your own role models whom she probably has no frame of reference for outside of your own distorted imagery? i do, and i hope if you ever become a teacher that you aren't so imposing to your own students - being so is much worse than being as closed-minded as you accuse your sister's teacher of being.
food for thought. i hope you grow from it.
Dante
Meyer & Dante Best Friends4eva
let's be real. he gave one speech at the brotherhood crusade rally in los angeles. other than that he was not involved. 2pac was a felon - he was not welcome to participate in government in any official capacities.LuvinAlize said:
sorry, i had to correct this since a lot of people have it twisted.
btw, masta ace has been doing the pee-wee football thing for about 6 years now.
I dunno, you're whole story seems kinda unreal to me. I think 80% of teachers don't even know who tupac was. She/he did? And the first thing that came to his/her mind was - he was a thug? A thug? Not something like ... "wasn't that a musician?" ... I dunno. Did the teacher turn up "who shot ya" and scream out "east cost for life biatch" too?
Dante said:
i didnt say that, i was just quoting my 13 year old kid sister... In any case, 2pac was still politically conscious and wasnt he the president of the New Afrikan Panthers? He was a felon, yes. But does that make it okay for a kid wearing a Pac shirt to have to turn it inside out... but Scarface is played by Al Pacino... so its aye-okay...
Dante said:
hey dante, i just caught this... I'd agree with u on all points... I think Tupac was more knowledgable then people thought him to be and thats what made his death so tragic because it was potential unfullfilled. I don't think of him as much a teacher but as someone striving to be a part of history and I'd even go as far as saying as he was a philosopher. Which is a "lover of wisdom" and you can see his philosophy on life through his music and his writings. Does that make him a teacher, no... But could he be a historic figure examined within the educational system? Like I was saying earlier, they already have had classes on Tupac at the University level.
Yes, Pac was still politically conscious and threw some of those messages into his songs, but I don't know if he was the president of that group. I know he had some involvement and had planned to have a bigger part in it (as stated in the interview CD that came with the Tupac Shakur Legacy book), but shortly afterward he had decided to give the entertainment industry a shot by first being a roadie for DU, then the rest is history.LuvinAlize said:In any case, 2pac was still politically conscious and wasnt he the president of the New Afrikan Panthers? He was a felon, yes. But does that make it okay for a kid wearing a Pac shirt to have to turn it inside out... but Scarface is played by Al Pacino... so its aye-okay...
Regardless, I don't think it was fair for your sister or whoever had to turn her shirt inside-out. But the whole Scarface analogy doesn't work properly. The difference is the nature of the creativity in gangster movies and rap music. In gangster movies, there is a script written by someone, and an actor portrays that role, and that actor's skills come through in the form of the accuracy of their portrayal and how well they bring life to the character. In rap music, the script writer and the rapper is (usually) one and the same person--the rapper--but that person's skills aren't in the portrayal (delivery, when it comes to rap) but in the lyrics. While Al Pacino is praised for his portrayal of a paranoid refugee-turned-drug kingpin, he's not out at night snorting moutains of cocaine while toting an M-16 with an attached grenade launcher off of the movie set. Rap music often covers the same story (rags-to-riches tales of MC this or DJ that selling crack and rolling in the Benz), but is taken far more seriously by both the rappers and fanbase themselves (emphasizing the "keeping it real" factor) and the rest of the Americans who want no part in rap (believing and, in some cases, acknowledging that the rappers themselves are telling stories that aren't far from the truth). And that is probably why some teachers frown at Pac's name being brought up and admired in a classroom setting (and the same thing was done during my senior year in high school when I had a 30-minute debate with my English teacher who wasn't even 30 at the time, yet he was always praising Eminem). While we know more of Pac's story and tend to always talk about his positive, politically aware side that wrote poems and played the Lucky role in Poetic Justice, the side that anti-Pac advocates know of--the "I don't give a fuck," gun-toting, bullet-dodging, Juice-sipping Bishop, Crip-fighting, M.O.B.-claiming side--was very much an intergral part of the "Thug Angel" dichotomy that Pac was, and was more publicized and sensationalized not just by the media, but by the majority of fans.
Unfortunately, a rather large portion of society doesn't understand rap music or where the talent of a rapper lies, which is why so many of them regard it as trash. And in this same argument also lies the reason why ghostwriting is looked down upon, but that's a whole other argument.
...and now I realize it's time to go to sleep.
While that's true, there are only a handful of universities across the U.S. with classes about Pac. Even in the Sociology of Hip Hop class that I took, only a small portion of the class was about Pac. I usually only heard Pac's name whenever another student would bring him up... and also in my final presentationLuvinAlize said:
But anyway, a couple classes here and there about Pac are cool and all, but that doesn't mean anything. Hell, I remember there being a class called the Sociology of the Simpsons (no joke), so take it lightly. And most of these classes aren't taught by actual university professors, but by TAs or people with hopes of being professors.i doubt what you said actually happened...
several things i wonder about, DrugBa11ad:
you are (seemingly) unusually anxious in responding to questions for evidence of the pumpkin your sister made (pics).
"i should have taken a picture of it! god damn it." -
you make it seem like there will be no picture of said pumpkin. you regret not taking one...
you say "I will post a picture of the pumpkin if she gets it back after the project".
on "if" - why if? if it is not being shown with the others, your sister is free to take it home.
on "after" - after the pumpkins have overstayed their welcome at the school, why would the teacher dispose of them? she would surely ask the kids if they want their pumpkins back.
when the pumpkin makes an appearance in this thread, your story will be somewhat validated. somewhat? yes, you could easily make one yourself. question is - will you go to the trouble to make a "fucking fabulous pumpkin of Tupac", or will you make one that bares no resemblance to pac and go on to say that "you know that comment was just an exaggeration of my sister's abilities". i doubt you will go to that trouble...
you will most likely search "pumpkin" on google images, hoping to find an image of a pumpkin that has been carved and whatnot (knowing that any could pass as a pumpkin a small girl made to look like tupac) in the backpages somewhere.
i dont know why you would make something like this up - it could very well happen in this society. but i doubt it did in this case.
you said that "[your] last posts were rushed, and this one also is."
yet the very next sentence ("But, you obviously have not researched Fred Hampton or Huey Newton extensively have you?") uses punctuation and spelling that many people on this board are incapable of using (btw that sentence is not perfect, but thats a limitation of your knowledge, not of the way in which you typed your posts).
im not saying that somebody cant get a point across in a short space of time and use perfect spelling and punctuation, but lets be real...
i can only guess why you would lie about that - perhaps you will link the (supposed) hurriedness in which your posts were written with any holes in your story?
if im wrong - my sincerest apologies good sir...
let me know when you get a hold of that pumpkin.
several things i wonder about, DrugBa11ad:
you are (seemingly) unusually anxious in responding to questions for evidence of the pumpkin your sister made (pics).
"i should have taken a picture of it! god damn it." -
you make it seem like there will be no picture of said pumpkin. you regret not taking one...
you say "I will post a picture of the pumpkin if she gets it back after the project".
on "if" - why if? if it is not being shown with the others, your sister is free to take it home.
on "after" - after the pumpkins have overstayed their welcome at the school, why would the teacher dispose of them? she would surely ask the kids if they want their pumpkins back.
when the pumpkin makes an appearance in this thread, your story will be somewhat validated. somewhat? yes, you could easily make one yourself. question is - will you go to the trouble to make a "fucking fabulous pumpkin of Tupac", or will you make one that bares no resemblance to pac and go on to say that "you know that comment was just an exaggeration of my sister's abilities". i doubt you will go to that trouble...
you will most likely search "pumpkin" on google images, hoping to find an image of a pumpkin that has been carved and whatnot (knowing that any could pass as a pumpkin a small girl made to look like tupac) in the backpages somewhere.
i dont know why you would make something like this up - it could very well happen in this society. but i doubt it did in this case.
you said that "[your] last posts were rushed, and this one also is."
yet the very next sentence ("But, you obviously have not researched Fred Hampton or Huey Newton extensively have you?") uses punctuation and spelling that many people on this board are incapable of using (btw that sentence is not perfect, but thats a limitation of your knowledge, not of the way in which you typed your posts).
im not saying that somebody cant get a point across in a short space of time and use perfect spelling and punctuation, but lets be real...
i can only guess why you would lie about that - perhaps you will link the (supposed) hurriedness in which your posts were written with any holes in your story?
if im wrong - my sincerest apologies good sir...
let me know when you get a hold of that pumpkin.
DeeezNuuuts83 said:
ur whole post was Well said...:thumb: but that line had me dying!:laugh:
Also, thats the things thats missing from Resurection and his recent albums... is that they're editing out most of the negative sides to him... not completely, but abundantly... I mean, I can understand his Mom basically saying, "tupac, wtf were u doing/thinking?" and cleaning up his image a bit... but you're right, there was still that negative side to him... And where us fans may point out and highlight the good that came from the Man... Everyone on the outsided, the school teachers for example, Michelle Maulkin, and whoever else, they all mostly recall his controversy and negative side...
DeeezNuuuts83 said:While that's true, there are only a handful of universities across the U.S. with classes about Pac. Even in the Sociology of Hip Hop class that I took, only a small portion of the class was about Pac. I usually only heard Pac's name whenever another student would bring him up... and also in my final presentation
yeah, in my cultural anthropology class they talked about the simpsons too! They used them to identify patrilineal lineage system. lol... crazy... and for that Sociology of Hip Hop Class, what did you do for your final presentation? Yeah, that Textual Appeal of Tupac class I remember reading was for an elective worth like 1 credit... or something, plus it was super extensive in reading.
I think in the long run, if the war doesnt end the world... in the long run, over time, Pac will be talked about more in some history classes. Where you might take a History of Jazz class as an Art Credit, a History of Hip-Hop or even on Tupac could conceivably happen. It isn't completely far fetched...
DeeezNuuuts83 said:While that's true, there are only a handful of universities across the U.S. with classes about Pac. Even in the Sociology of Hip Hop class that I took, only a small portion of the class was about Pac. I usually only heard Pac's name whenever another student would bring him up... and also in my final presentation
There are classes that focus solely on Tupac and literary influences that shaped the person he was. My university, relatively prestigious too, has a course on Tupac. http://www.washington.edu/students/icd/S/chid/270gmr2.html
But, you're right. It's not a tenured professor that teaches the course. Probably a grad student that's a fan or something.
DrugBa11ad - what level of schooling do you teach? (Elementary, Middle or High, College, etc)
Anyway, as far as Pac's contributions go, I think his primary contribution to the world is just the beautiful tracks and lyrics he left us with. All of the empowerment and motivation that fills up those tracks - that is his contribution.
I got advice from Makaveli, all he told me was this - Nigga, get off your ass if you plan to be rich
Anyway, as far as Pac's contributions go, I think his primary contribution to the world is just the beautiful tracks and lyrics he left us with. All of the empowerment and motivation that fills up those tracks - that is his contribution.
I got advice from Makaveli, all he told me was this - Nigga, get off your ass if you plan to be rich
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