Thursday, October 23, 2008

HIP HOP AMERIKA

just felt like writing this-
When I was in the 10th grade we read the poem on the statue of liberty and wrote our own version, if you know my politics then you can imagine what mine was like, basically speaking on how America says "bring me your poor" so I can use you, and under pay you, and label you as an alien, and discriminate against you. Anyways I have always had a political undertone to most of the poems that I write and I play on the line between hopeful and hopeless depending on how i feel, most of my poems are extremely hopeful like we-gotta-rise-and-smile-and just keep- living-and-loving-and protesting type poems and I always contributed that to listening to Hip Hop. The hip hop artists that I love, some of who I have been honored to sit down and talk with about their political views, are ones that can balance that same battle of hopefulness and hopeless, so it's not sugar coating it, but also not so depressing you don't wanna hear it. In the spirit of the election and just a random thought in my head I started comparing Hip Hop lyrics that are political, to political speeches, thus Hip Hop Amerika.


"The American dream wasn't meant for me, cause lady liberty's a hypocrite she lied to me, promised me freedom, education, and equality never gave me nothing but slavery but now look at how dangerous you made me calling me a mad man because im strong and bold."
-Tupac Shakur

"Block by block, we restored hope and opportunity to those neighborhoods, and I can believe we can do the same thing for the working families of America."
-Barack

"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom. "
-Martin Luther King Jr.

"They got money for wars but can't feed the poor."
-Tupac Shakur

"I wish you insight so you could see for yourself
You could see the signs when the jackers is scheming
And the cops is comin, you could read they mind
You could see from behind, you could redefine
the game as we know it, one dream at a time
I'm American dreamin"
-Shawn Carter

"I don't see an American Dream I see an American Nightmare."
Malcolm X

"...it seems we living the American dream, the people highest up got the lowest self esteem, the prettiest people do the ugliest things, for the road to riches and diamond rings..."
-Kanye


As you know I am a huge Obama supporter and part of that is my hope for America to be
a place of equality where great leaders of any color are given the voice. But I been thinking
about how things are swept under the rug now, and how having a black president is not going
to change that, and it might make it even worse (don't get me wrong its still worth it too have
Obama as president) A lot of white people believe racism is a thing of the past and that nothing
needs to be done, even thought it is very apparent that America itself is a racist system. I know
Obama can bring us change, and in every speech he gives I am given hope, but I want to make sure
that the victory of having a wonderful president when he is elected in Nov. doesn't turn into,
oh good the battle is one we can all go home now (when I say battle I don't mean the war in the
middle east I mean the freedom fighter peaceful protesting injustice battle).

So vote Obama but know that he is just one amazing man and there's a whole
lot of fucked up people in this country doing everything in their power to make
sure the systems stay the way they are, so it takes all the everyday freedom fighters
out there to help that change come...


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