My little sister, Tupac, Pumpkins, and discrimination... I need your help..

[SonOf2pac]

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.

you gonna take that course? does it count towards credits or what's the deal? that's tight though. i didnt know you went to washington. they're legendary for their 2pac class.

 

[mackaveliM]

I just want to say that people keep on arguing over that fact that although 'Pac was a smart person and wanted to do some good, not many of his plans or ideas ever came to fruition and there are plenty of other historical figures more worthy of praise and adulation.I agree with that, but this isn't about putting Tupac in the V.I.P. section of heaven with Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and Mother Theresa. All I would ask for is that he is put in the same category of role models as Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Elvis,and John Lennon. As Michael Eric Dyson said correctly,Tupac is the first black mythical icon.That means something, Tupac had his flaws, just like JFK,RFK, Frank Sinatra and everybody else that I have previously mentioned. The majority of his mistakes that the media and probably this teacher thinks are so bad his things were just words that he used, cursing in his songs, saying "nigga" and "thuglife" and him saying bad things about Biggie. Of course he was convicted of sexual abuse which is a pretty big thing to overcome, but I think we have all seen enough stories on court tv and read books like John Grisham's new one, "The Innocent Man" to know that people are wrongly convicted all the time. I think one of the major points that can be made for Pac is that he had an image and he used his art in the same way that Arnold, Al Pacino and countless other actors use it.Sometimes in Movies 'Pac was the bad guy, sometimes he was the good guy, same in his music. But I think that overall, in his art and in his life 'Pac played the good guy more often than not.

 

[Think_ThuGLiFE]

2pac>>>>>> education

 

[S O F I]

you gonna take that course? does it count towards credits or what's the deal? that's tight though. i didnt know you went to washington. they're legendary for their 2pac class.

It's a 5 credit class, it counts for I&S, which is an area of knowledge that you need to have 20 credits in to graduate with a Bachelors here.

I don't plan on taking it. It's a waste of time and tuition money, in my opinion. Maybe in the future.

 

[ManiacDego]

a tupac course at a university couldnt be very serious lol

 

[EriMakaveli]

I'd rather my teacher denounce 2pac than make a silly attempt at being compassionate.

Just last week my white red-haired english teacher hit me with a low blow:
"Do any of you know about TooPack?"
"He had his faults"
"But he had...a message"

I puked in my mouth.

 

[MaKaVeLi2K3]

i somewhat agree with her teacher that a 5th grader should study more traditional historic figures.

that being said, people always talk about how pac taught them so much, but i'd actually like to know WHAT 2pac taught you. no offense, but comments like...

I take sociology in college, and I can tell you that I've learned nothing in the course. Why? Because I learned it all from 2Pac

...are kind of disgusting. 2pac's message was not science, a solution, and was based on his interpretation of problems that needed to be addressed. seriously saying pac was a teacher is a gross misinterpretation of his themes.

who would you rather defend you in court or perform surgery on your heart - a person who kept it real listening to blasphemy and hold ya head, or someone who studied the history and traditional lessons of their respective disciplines? hey, i love pac's music, but putting the blinders on the traditions of education because you're keeping it real is, well, keeping it real dumb.

I go to a four year college. I take advanced Sociology. You're correct. 2Pac's message was not science, he had a philosophy about problems in our SOCIETY, but it doesn't seem like you've taken this course before. The arguement that history has been a battle of class struggle is clearly what 2Pac says in his interviews, songs, etc. It is a Marxian belief, and is something taught in sociology courses in college. The government keeps people in jail because it needs to have people in jail for various reasons (I don't want to get too much into it) and most of them just HAPPEN to be African American. We discuss why people are placed in the ghetto and why nothing is done about it. Where am I getting this from? 2Pac? Nope. My notes.

I'm not an idiot who is blindly defending 2Pac. Take the course before you make any comments. Also, maybe I said it the wrong way before. The things taught in this class have only CONFIRMED the issues that 2Pac addressed in his songs. With all this, I haven't learned much except for the details on sociologists themselves. The instant we have a discussion on society and issues that lie within it that may never be changed, 2Pac pops up in my head.

 

[critikaldesignz]

Funny you brought this up, we studied Tupac's poetry work in English class last year.

 

[DrugBa11ad]

Hahaha. Yeah, whoever brought up Ghandi! Let's support a man who believed in a caste system and despised darker skinned indians and africans. Again, thier is the WHITEWASHING of history, "teach the kids to not be violent, teach them to be obedient workers".

And to Dante, look up John Brown. And hell, while your at it, look up any other ABOLITIONIST, thier was a decent amount of them. Yes, I do look down on a man that could use slave labor and murder as a way to achieving his materialistic goals, and if you don't look down on him, then that's fine, support who you want to support. And Columbus did not discover America anyway. REAL historians know that.

To the stupid mother fucker that is questioning if this story is real... I'm not even going to waste my time trying to change your mind. Stay ignorant, it's probably better for you.

Anyway, I'm off to the school right now, checking to see if any last contributions were made, thanks to everyone who helped out.

Peace.

Oh nad MobNigga I plan on teaching highschool education.

 

[goymz]

The arguement that history has been a battle of class struggle is clearly what 2Pac says in his interviews, songs, etc. It is a Marxian belief, and is something taught in sociology courses in college.

I agree that - rightly or wrongly - the proportion of African Americans in jail is high. But incarceration is a private business - whatever those "various reasons" of the government you allude to are (I don't want you to get into it either) I'll assume that purely in terms of politics, it's an aged theory...Guantanamo Bay however?

I disagree that history has been a battle of class struggle. Take the last one hundred years - WWI was about territory. WWII and the Cold War was about Ideology. From the works of academics that I read two years ago, the war on terror was then predicted to be a conflict of civilizations.

But ignore the present climate and apply WWI/WWII ideas to the history of the world. And don't forget to take religion into account.

It is widely proved that many theories of Marx are wrong. This is also taught in sociology.

To peg Marxist philosophies ("clearly") to 2pac when debate cannot decide whether history should remember him as a gangster, actor, poet, philosopher, voice box, man, advocate or whichever combination you please, seems unsound to me.


@ Drugba11ad: I don't trust anyone who can't spell "their".


Most importantly, I also invoke the right to see the pumpkin.

 

[Dante]

Hahaha. Yeah, whoever brought up Ghandi! Let's support a man who believed in a caste system and despised darker skinned indians and africans. Again, thier is the WHITEWASHING of history, "teach the kids to not be violent, teach them to be obedient workers".

you seem intent on nit-picking minute aspects of historical figures as a means to bring them down and negate their achievements. pretty sad if you ask me. if you're discounting ghandi's (of all people) contributions to the social order of the world simply because you disagree with a singular belief of his, well then you'll be starved to find anyone who measures up to your high standards. ironic that you dispose of ghandi so readily, yet you seem to have a boner for the sainthood of one tupac shakur.

And to Dante, look up John Brown. And hell, while your at it, look up any other ABOLITIONIST, thier was a decent amount of them. Yes, I do look down on a man that could use slave labor and murder as a way to achieving his materialistic goals, and if you don't look down on him, then that's fine, support who you want to support. And Columbus did not discover America anyway. REAL historians know that.

i almost have a completed phd. i do not require your post-high school "i know everything and no one else knows squat" suggested learning. you have such a distorted viewpoint on everything that it's difficult to take your points seriously. if you honestly think that all things pertaining to slavery should be excreted from historical reverence then you'll find yourself without history. slavery has existed in one form or another since the dawn of civilization (social darwinism, class distinction, and extending to marxist principles of economy) and only in the past century was it regulated and essentially dismantled. ...and yes, of course america was here before columbus discovered it (try not to be a complete moron. centuries before the would-be native americans crossed from asia to alaska and populated the land thereby "discovering" it. columbus did the same for europe, which (even if you hate your pink skin as much as you do) introduced the new world to your european ancestors.

To the stupid mother fucker that is questioning if this story is real... I'm not even going to waste my time trying to change your mind. Stay ignorant, it's probably better for you.

ah, now THERE'S a winning argument. god forbid you actually address topics without being a complete and utterly defensive numbnut.

Anyway, I'm off to the school right now, checking to see if any last contributions were made, thanks to everyone who helped out.

good. maybe your dumb ass honkey crackerfied eurocentric son of a bitch beef eating teacher who reinvents history and fails to recognize that the white man destroyed everything in the world and made ghandi into collin ferguson will actually come correct and teach you how mother theresa was actually a whore who deserves zero agilation.

Oh nad MobNigga I plan on teaching highschool education

from a review of this and other posts you have made, i hope the schoolboards in your community see you for what you are and decline your application for employment regardless how much they may need a teacher. you have such an immensely distorted view of history and such hatred of minute characteristics that translate into complete dismissal of significant figures that if my son ever came home spewing that nonsense i'd pull him out of your class and see to it that you go under review immediately.

@ Drugba11ad: I don't trust anyone who can't spell "their".

...especially a would-be teacher. hard to convert the masses whithout 4th grade grammar rules, eh? amen, brother.

Most importantly, I also invoke the right to see the pumpkin.

it will be a sub-par jack-o-lantern with a rag tied on its top

 

[DeeezNuuuts83]

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.

That class was probably the easiest class I've taken in my life. I wrote a couple papers (getting all high scores), but the final for the class was everyone doing a five-minute presentation on pretty much any aspect of hip-hop, whether it's on an element (MCing, DJing, B-boying, tagging), a time period or a person in particular, or whatever. I seriously had zero preparation, went up there and just started talking about Pac's upbringing, and the five minutes was up before I even talked about him going to Death Row. I got 100%.

But, you're right. It's not a tenured professor that teaches the course. Probably a grad student that's a fan or something.

That was the case with the lecturer of my class. But the funny thing is, I used to post on a variety of hip-hop sites, and I remember there was some revered post by some lady (last name "Wright"), and if I recall correctly, the article/essay she wrote was about how only black people could really have the real social motivation to make hip-hop music due to their struggles or something along those lines. I don't remember it exactly (because I read that article in 2002), but the incredible thing was that I noticed she was from UC Irvine, where I attended, and she ended up being the instructor of the Sociology of Hip Hop class offered at my university. I responded to her post, strongly disagreeing with her overall argument while acknowledging a lot of her points, and we played e-mail tag for a bit for counterargument purposes. A few months later, I ended up enrolling in her class (once it was offered again), and we met face-to-face and reminded her that I was the person who had responded to her essay posted on some internet site, and I think that once the class started, she took a liking to me and had a deep respect for me.

I don't remember all the books for the class, but I think it was Holler If You Hear Me (by Dyson), Hip Hop America and a few others. (As a side note, the Welcome to Death Row DVD was originally on the curriculum, but for some reason it had been taken off when I took it.) Plus we had to watch Bamboozled.

 

[DrugBa11ad]

I just got home from the school, it went perfect.

First, the teacher apoligized and said she had been thinking about it all last night. Then she said the Tupac pumpkin would go on display with the rest of the pumpkins. We then got on the discussion of how some english classes around the country use Tupac's poetry as part of thier english course, and how some universities have classes dedicated to Tupac or revolving around his social and musical implications.

So she asked if I had any of his poems, and I told her I had an entire book filled with his poetry, she asked if I could send it in with Samantha so they could use some of his poems in her English class. I'm pretty excited. She was a very understanding lady, and very willing to rework her original plan, which was to have Tupac excluded, She admitted many times she was wrong for doing that. So I think she's a pretty cool lady.

On top of that, we got onto the topic of my doing school talks for the kids about kempo (I go to elementary schools and do "Kempo kids talks" in order to try to get kids to start martial arts at our school), and she decided it would be good for me to come in and do a school talk and she wants to schedule that now.

So all in all, the whole ordeal went over perfect, thanks for those who helped me out.

ONE

 

[DrugBa11ad]

you seem intent on nit-picking minute aspects of historical figures as a means to bring them down and negate their achievements. pretty sad if you ask me. if you're discounting ghandi's (of all people) contributions to the social order of the world simply because you disagree with a singular belief of his, well then you'll be starved to find anyone who measures up to your high standards. ironic that you dispose of ghandi so readily, yet you seem to have a boner for the sainthood of one tupac shakur.

No, I just believe in teaching FULLY. I do not disagree with teaching Christopher Columbus, or teaching Ghandi, but I believe that you should teach the full individual, not certain parts that make them seem more superior then they were in reality. Ghandi was a racist that supported the caste system. He was also a believer of non-violence and fought British imperialism, but teach them both sides of the story, not just one.

i almost have a completed phd. i do not require your post-high school "i know everything and no one else knows squat" suggested learning. you have such a distorted viewpoint on everything that it's difficult to take your points seriously. if you honestly think that all things pertaining to slavery should be excreted from historical reverence then you'll find yourself without history. slavery has existed in one form or another since the dawn of civilization (social darwinism, class distinction, and extending to marxist principles of economy) and only in the past century was it regulated and essentially dismantled. ...and yes, of course america was here before columbus discovered it (try not to be a complete moron. centuries before the would-be native americans crossed from asia to alaska and populated the land thereby "discovering" it. columbus did the same for europe, which (even if you hate your pink skin as much as you do) introduced the new world to your european ancestors.

Believe me, I don't hate myself. I'm far to concieted for that .

Again, I disagree with taking things OUT of history, but I do intend to provide history FULLY, and highlight the facts that have purposely been LEFT OUT of our children's education. Children should have the oppurtunity to seek an education that presents history to them without biased eurocentric views.

ah, now THERE'S a winning argument. god forbid you actually address topics without being a complete and utterly defensive numbnut.

Actually I responded to all of your arguements, I just don't have the time to worry about if people on streethop.com forums believe my pumpkin story

...especially a would-be teacher. hard to convert the masses whithout 4th grade grammar rules, eh? amen, brother.

Maybe I do mix up "thier" and "there" or whatever you guys were referring to. But at least I capitalize my sentances, hard to have a "phd" without 4th grade grammer, right bitch?

it will be a sub-par jack-o-lantern with a rag tied on its top

A fifth grader made it you dumb ass, what do you expect it to be? It looked a lot better then most of the other 5th grade pumpkins though.

 

[DeeezNuuuts83]

I just got home from the school, it went perfect.

First, the teacher apoligized and said she had been thinking about it all last night. Then she said the Tupac pumpkin would go on display with the rest of the pumpkins. We then got on the discussion of how some english classes around the country use Tupac's poetry as part of thier english course, and how some universities have classes dedicated to Tupac or revolving around his social and musical implications.

So she asked if I had any of his poems, and I told her I had an entire book filled with his poetry, she asked if I could send it in with Samantha so they could use some of his poems in her English class. I'm pretty excited. She was a very understanding lady, and very willing to rework her original plan, which was to have Tupac excluded, She admitted many times she was wrong for doing that. So I think she's a pretty cool lady.

On top of that, we got onto the topic of my doing school talks for the kids about kempo (I go to elementary schools and do "Kempo kids talks" in order to try to get kids to start martial arts at our school), and she decided it would be good for me to come in and do a school talk and she wants to schedule that now.

So all in all, the whole ordeal went over perfect, thanks for those who helped me out.

ONE

Good job.

 

[Dante]

Maybe I do mix up "thier" and "there" or whatever you guys were referring to. But at least I capitalize my sentances, hard to have a "phd" without 4th grade grammer, right bitch?

in addition to the general acceptance of the lack of a shift key in informal internet conversation, my keyboard has a stickey shift key. deal with it. glad to see that all you were capable of was back-pedaling and the rebuttal of a uselessly trivial point. big gold star for the history nazi.

A fifth grader made it you dumb ass, what do you expect it to be? It looked a lot better then most of the other 5th grade pumpkins though.

you also don't seem to know the difference between than and then. no worries, i'll update my sig for you.

 

[DrugBa11ad]

in addition to the general acceptance of the lack of a shift key in informal internet conversation, my keyboard has a stickey shift key. deal with it. glad to see that all you were capable of was back-pedaling and the rebuttal of a uselessly trivial point. big gold star for the history nazi.

hahaha, I see how it is, you can justify being a stiffler with me and my grammatical skills on an internet forum, yet you make excuses for your errors. Right, right.

First he patronizes me for NOT addressing issues brought to my attention, so then I make sure to address the issues he presents, and he patronizes me for addressing them! Make up your mind dawg. God damn.

you also don't seem to know the difference between than and then. no worries, i'll update my sig for you.

I'm glad you care so much about me. You're such a sweetheart.

 

[S O F I]

I disagree that history has been a battle of class struggle. Take the last one hundred years - WWI was about territory. WWII and the Cold War was about Ideology. From the works of academics that I read two years ago, the war on terror was then predicted to be a conflict of civilizations.

But ignore the present climate and apply WWI/WWII ideas to the history of the world. And don't forget to take religion into account.

It is widely proved that many theories of Marx are wrong. This is also taught in sociology.

It would be wrong to assume that Marx's theory of class struggle could explain why wars occur as you're putting his idea of history in another context. That's not what it was about. Marx's theory was on regimes and economy. His belief was that class struggle is driven by economic change and that history is progressive. By progressive, he was talking about stages of history: Primitive communism -> slavery -> feudalism -> Capitalism and eventually Communism as the transcendence of history.

 

[Morris]

And to Dante, look up John Brown. And hell, while your at it, look up any other ABOLITIONIST, thier was a decent amount of them. Yes, I do look down on a man that could use slave labor and murder as a way to achieving his materialistic goals,

I appreciated the irony of those two sentences placed together. Or are you unaware that John Brown personally murdered pro-slavery people of all ages in Kansas before his "raid" in 1859?

And Columbus did not discover America anyway. REAL historians know that.

You're arguing semantics. Columbus's 1492 voyage was the most important voyage and discovery in the Western world's history, regardless of where he landed in the Americas. Columbus discovered the New World for Europeans, regardless of Native Americans (and possibly Vikings) having been in the Americas before 1492.

 

[DrugBa11ad]

I appreciated the irony of those two sentences placed together. Or are you unaware that John Brown personally murdered pro-slavery people of all ages in Kansas before his "raid" in 1859?

I should have changed that to "slave labor and unjustified murder." Brown had every right to murder those holding slaves captive.

You're arguing semantics. Columbus's 1492 voyage was the most important voyage and discovery in the Western world's history, regardless of where he landed in the Americas. Columbus discovered the New World for Europeans, regardless of Native Americans (and possibly Vikings) having been in the Americas before 1492.

Argueing semantics? No, thier is well documented findings of Africans arriving in the Americas before Columbus, and possibly vikings as you mentioned. I do not disagree that Columbus's voyage was important, it allowed for the genocide of the native Americans to take place, but I will argue that he was the first to make the voyage. Therefore, he didn't discover the Americas, contrary to what we teach our children in school.