Bury Me a G

A decade ago today, Tupac Shakur died after a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas. Yet he has become immortalized through current remixes, desperate imitators, and college dorm posters. People continue to idolize Tupac because he was neither derivative nor uninspired; unlike today’s “hyphy” or “crunk” hip-hop movement, Tupac’s songs were intelligent and substantial. They don’t repeat moronic verses over and over, but rather convey a coherent and articulate message.

This is my favorite poem by Tupac:

When Your Hero Falls

When your hero falls from grace
All fairy tales are uncovered
Myths exposed and pain magnified
The greatest pain discovered
You taught me to be strong
But I’m confused to see you so weak
You said never to give up
And it hurts to see you welcome defeat

When your hero falls so do the stars
And so does the perception of tomorrow
Without my hero there is only
Me alone to deal with my sorrow
Your heart ceases to work
And your soul is not happy at all
What are you expected to do
When Your only hero falls?

Changes, perhaps his best known social statement, is both a sample a response to Bruce Hornsby’s The Way it is, a song about the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement. Hornsby’s song expresses the pain of segregation and the close-mindedness of racial policy. Tupac viewed his current world, amidst the racial and social complexity of South Central Los Angeles, and points out the covert segregation and hatred that still exists. His response is blunt: “I still see no changes”. Changes asks many questions: by acquiescing to the inherent wrongs of racism mentioned in The Way it is, are we currently condoning such actions because we find it convenient or rather because we simply are limited and cannot progress? Or is Tupac optimistically viewing a rather dismal situation and hoping for, well, changes?

I’d love to hear E-40’s take on the matter, but I’m afraid that the message would be lost amidst an unintelligible jumble of “hyphy”, “thizz”, and “giggin”. Today’s mainstream hip-hop has lost its luster, trading in it’s artistic edge for materialistic image. Too bad: if today’s artists took off their “stunna shades”, perhaps they’d see the potential their art form truly possess to both inform and inspire.

 

Martin Luther King Day

Today is Martin Luther King Day, a day where we honor the greatest civil rights activist in the history of the United States. Dr. King adopted Gandhi's non-violent form of protest to convey his message of equality and brotherhood in the United States. He strove to end segregation and bridge the gaps created by years of racism and hatred.

Did Dr. King set out what he wanted to accomplish? What was this "dream" everyone keeps talking about?

According to Dr. King, he wanted to see a world where black and white children could play in harmony, in a world where they would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

What saddens me about this day is how Dr. King's beautiful dream has been tainted or dishonored by impatience, hatred, and anger. Instead of brotherhood, America is still divided racially, with great economic inequality among minority populations in inner cities.

Two events come to mind when thinking about King's thwarted dream: the LA riots and the recent riots in Paris. The LA riots came about because of a lack of understanding and trust among LA's inner city black, Latino, and Korean populations, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of people, the destruction of property and lives, and creating a sense of shock and urgency in America. The LA riots was a wake up call, letting Americans know that life for poor minorities and inner city folks was not OK. Hatred blinded these different minority groups, who fought each other instead of the malfunctioning system that had propogated their own plight.

The Paris riots more recently displayed the frustration and pain a minority group can express if put into a compromised situation in a country that neither trusts nor wants them. The French in particular have always been xenophobic and jingoistic, leading to the mistreatment of their large Arab and African populations within Paris. Pain simply produces more pain.

As I saw images of cars being torched in Paris, I thought to myself this is the worst way to bring about change. If an Arab in France wants to be seen as an equal, surely there is a better way to convey their frustration than on a car or a street light. What good does that do, to burn ones own neighborhood down? Its already downtrodden, don't make it any worse.

This might be brazen for me to say, being as I have never lived a life of poverty in a poor community. True, I suppose I am being the realist rather than the idealist.

Watching a video of the LA Riots, I saw interviews of black rioters and Korean merchants, both minorities struggling to survive in the same city under similar financial duress. However, the rioters blamed the Korean merchants for their dire situation, and the Koreans blamed the black rioters for their damaged stores and stolen merchandise.

Hatred and racism is a vicious cycle that propogates itself. Dr. King's dream was that all races could empathize with each other: only then could everyone understand universal suffering and pain. Perhaps this is the Buddhist in me, but pain and suffering is ultimately what unites all living things, including human beings.

My solution? Its bold to say I have one, but I have a humble suggestion: increase education towards understanding different ethnic groups and encourage diversity in all public endeavors. This should start from the bottom up, with school children and up through the working environment. Communities like LA should eliminate a black, Korean, or Latino brand from its own citizens. Fear leads to hate. Only when we stop fearing others because they are different then we can move forward as a community. Once this happens, these black or Korean citizens in Los Angeles lose their veil and become something higher and greater: an American. That's it, just American. The American that you and I are, united by the same American dream, which was Martin Luther King's dream: to live in a world without definition or arbitrary judgement, where one can succeed if they put their heart into it and work hard.

 

Kanye West and Hurricane Katrina

Kanye West shocked the nation by saying “George Bush doesn’t care about black people” in the wake of the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Were his comments excessive? Check it out here.

Perhaps West is correct, the delay and seemingly lack of concern for the residents of Mississippi and Louisiana by the Bush administration is a sign of disinterest toward a certain group. Needless to say, the media is portraying the victims in a mostly colored light. Media, as West has correctly stated, has portrayed the white and black victims of this disaster in different terms. Why are black people stealing food when whites are finding it? Simple racist tendancies still exist in our media unfortunately, and it needs to be dealt with.

But perhaps this issue is deeper than that. The lack of preparation and support for the southern states affected by this disaster shows a lack of concern by the current administration. While I will not go on an extreme edge as many Berkeley Communist papers have gone and say that Bush killed these people, he did not exactly deliever many of them from destruction. While helicopters and armored tanks are being shipped to Iraq every week, people in New Orleans were dying of thirst and malnutrition. Where are our priorities?

An interesting thought was brought up today at work. My boss pointed out that she did not appreciate the Daily Californian calling the victims “refugees”. Upon further review, we discovered that “refugee” refers to someone who is forced from their home and seeks asylum or “refuge” from another state. Are these victims refugees because they must travel to Texas? No, Cubans sailing to this country are seeking asylum and are thus refugees. People forced from their homes in New Orleans are simply victims of a terrible tragedy exacerbated by a lack of support from their government.