Tupac Shakur
Obituary

by MC49

Rap artist Tupac Shakur (AKA 2Pac) died on August 13th, six days after being shot four times in a car-to-car shooting in Las Vegas. The imperialist press described Shakur as being "known for songs of violence" and wrote that "Shakur often boasted of his 'gangsta' ties and had the words 'Thug Life' tattooed across his abdomen."(1) The Los Angeles Times also ran a sidebar headlined "Rap Violence" next to an article about Shakur.(2) Blaming the victim, imperialist lackey Jesse Jackson said of Shakur, "Sometimes the lure of violent culture is so magnetic that even when one overcomes it with material success, it continues to call. He couldn't break the cycle."(3)

Furthermore, the imperialist press is doing its best not to let people know about Shakur's more political statements and lyrics. One quote from Shakur sums up the tension between his lumpen gangster side and his proletarian revolutionary side, while also serving as an answer to the hypocritical rulers and lackeys who point their fingers at imperialism's creations: "I'm a product of this society....You know, I'm a revolutionary. I'm straight thuggin' out here. Thuggin' against society. Thuggin' against the system that made me."(4)

MIM does not agree with Shakur's equation of "thuggin'" and revolutionary activism. MIM's enemy, furthermore, is not society. We seek to unite all the elements of society which can be united against imperialism, capitalism, and patriarchy -- principally imperialism at this time.

While Shakur had his lumpen "gangsta" side, he also had a self-critical take on his role in it. "'This thug life stuff, it was just ignorance,' Shakur said in an interview last year with Vibe Magazine. 'My intentions was always in the right place...I'm going to show people my true intentions and my true heart. I'm going to show them the man that my mother raised.'"(2)

In 1971, Afeni Shakur, Tupac's mother, was one of the "Panther 21" defendants falsely accused of a bombing conspiracy. As a result, Tupac was in literally in prison before he was born.(3) His mother was in prison for years for the crime of being anti-imperialist. The son that his mother raised would be a revolutionary son who would fight imperialism on the side of the oppressed people of the world.

The best answers to Shakur's self-righteous critics can be found in his lyrics. In that spirit, some of his best are excerpted here.

Violent (1991)

They claim that I'm violent Just 'cause I refuse to be silent
These hypocrites are having fits 'Cause I'm not buying it, defying it
Envious, because I will rebel against Any oppressor,
and this is known as self-defense ...

I told'em fight back, attack on society
If this is violence, then violent's what I gotta be
If you investigate, you'll find out where it's coming from
Look through our history; Amerika's the violent one
Unlock my brain, break the chains of your misery
It's time to pay back for evil shit you did to me
They call me militant and racist cause I won't resist
You wanna censor something?
Motherfucker, censor this!
My words are weapons, and i'm steppin' to the sirens
Waking up the masses
But you Claim that I'm violent ...

Buy The CD This Song is On

Words Of Wisdom (1991)

Killing us one by one
In one way or another Amerika will find a way to eliminate the problem
One by one
The problem is the troublesome Black youth of the ghetto
And one by one
We are being wiped off the face of this earth
At an extremely alarming rate
And even more alarming is the fact
That we are not fighting back ...

This is for the masses
The lower classes
The ones you left out
Jobs were given,
Better livin'
But we were kept out
Made to feel inferior
But we're superior
Break the chains
In our brains
That made us fear ya'
Pledge allegiance to a flag that neglects us
Honor a man that refused to respect us
Emancipation, proclamation, please!
Lincoln just said that to save the nation
These are lies that we all accepted
"Say no to drugs",
But the government's kept it
Running through our community,
Killing the unity (5)

The war on drugs is a war on you and me
And yet they say this is
"the home of the free"

But if you ask me its all about hypocrisy
The Constitution, yo, it don't apply to me and Lady Liberty,
stupid [sexist epithet deleted-- MIM] lied to me
Steady strong nobody's gonna like what I pumpin'
But its wrong to keeping someone from learning something
So get up, its time to start nation-building I'm fed up, we gotta start teaching children
That they can be all that they want to be
There's much more to life than just poverty

This is definitely words of wisdom
I charge you with the crime of rape, murder, and assault
For suppressing and punishing my people
I charge you with robbery for robbing me of my history
I charge you with false imprisonment for keeping me
Trapped in the projects
And the jury finds you guilty on all accounts
And you are to serve the consequences for your evil schemes
Prosecutor, do you have any more evidence? ...

On with the knowledge of the place we've been
No one will ever oppress this race again
No Malcolm X in my history text
Why is that?
'Cause he tried to educate and liberate all blacks
Why is Martin Luther King in my book each week?
He told Blacks, if they get smacked, turn the other cheek
I don't get it, so many questions went through my mind I get sweated,
They act as if asking questions is a crime
But forget it, 'cause one day I'm gonna prove them wrong ...

The Amerikan dream, though it seems like its attainable
They're pulling your sleeve, don't believe
'Cause it will strangle ya' ...

Thought they had us beaten when they took out King
But the battle ain't over till the Black man sings
Words of Wisdom

Buy The CD This Song is On

Nightmare

that's what I am--Amerika's nightmare
I am what you made me
The hate and the evil that you gave me
I shine of a reminder of what you have done to my people
For four hundred plus years
You should be scared
You should be running
You should be trying to silence me
But you can not escape fate
Well it is my turn to come
Just as you rose you shall fall
By my hands Amerika,
You reap what you sow 2pacalypse--Amerika's Nightmare
Ice Cube and Da Lench Mob--Amerika's Nightmare
Above the Law--Amerika's Nightmare
Paris--Amerika's Nightmare
Public Enemy--Amerika's Nightmare
Krs-One--Amerika's Nightmare
New Afrikan Panthers--Amerika's Nightmare
Mutulu Shakur--Amerika's Nightmare
Geronimo Pratt--Amerika's Nightmare
Assata Shakur--Amerika's Nightmare

MIM notes the passing of Tupac Shakur with sadness, and encourages his fans to work with us to follow through on the revolutionary, proletarian aspects of his message.

Notes:

1. Los Angeles Times, 14 September, 1996, pp. A1, A18. Also in Los Angeles Times, 9 September, 1996, p. A1: "the rap star known for the violence in his lyrics and his life".
2. Los Angeles Times, 9 September, 1996, p. A16.
3. Los Angeles Times, 14 September, 1996, p. A18.
4. Spin, date unknown (approx. 1995), p.44.
5. Shakur was completely correct on this point. See MIM Notes article in this issue.

Buy 2Pac's Greatest Hits

Tupac Shakur "Resurrection" www.2Paclegacy.com 2003 This is the recent Tupac Shakur album to buy. Although he died in 1996, 2Pac continues to have albums come out and blow away most of the competition. As everyone has pointed out, the Tupac story seems to center on a thug vs. angel dynamic. This album's executive producer is Tupac Shakur's mother Afeni Shakur. It's not surpising that this album comes out better than some of the others that might be more motivated by money. In this album and "Nu-Mixx Klazzics," Tupac Shakur has numerous songs about his impending death. He was not "paranoid" despite idiots like the Amazon reviewer who said he had a "persecution complex." It just goes to show how stupid people can be that even after 2Pac saw friends shot, got shot once and survived and after being shot dead, people say 2Pac had a persecution complex and not real persecution. Tupac Shakur had a real problem. Middle-class people should not try to lump in everyone else with their own latest trip to the psychiatrist or pop-psych reading. As others have pointed out, the one down side to this album is the collaboration with 50 Cent who had a cameo with 2pac back in the day. Today 50 Cent is the big deal popularity-wise. However, as others have also pointed out, this will also feed 2Pac's ongoing fame. Eminem also produced two of the tracks and 2Pac borrowed some Phil Collins with permission. There are some negative aspects of the album. "I ain't got time for bitches" is a repeated lyric in "Bury Me a G." The context is better for the use of the word "ho," because he says he has to look out for his "riches." A repeated theme is that 2Pac does not trust anyone except his family. He has girlfriends and other "friends" he does not trust and he named various individuals as police agents. Tupac lived on the edge between revolution and lumpen gangster life. His lyrics show that he knew that. One thing we like about 2Pac is that in some circumstances he was exceptionally anti-Liberal. He identifies with the man who has to stand guard at the door with an AK-47 (a common image of Malcolm X). At the same time, we don't always see the best goals from Tupac Shakur. Like subsequent rap, he is talking about making a lot of money while also completely rebelling against the government. The problem is that rappers like 50 Cent took only the bourgeois part of 2Pac's lumpen attitude--not the politics. One has to wonder whether the mafia's distrust of the government is the model and not the Black Panthers. 2Pac answers that with the song "Panther Power" in this album. We are not the only reviewer confused by the "Bury Me a G" song. It says that he was a thug as a younger teenage man and tells his mother to bury him a "G." One unfortunate thing is that "G-Man" is an FBI man, but it appears from a 1996 interview that 2Pac uses "G" for gangster.(1) In the same interview he says he's looking for the perfect womyn, which might say he does not think all wimmin are bitches. At the same time, what 2Pac does is introduce theory into common language. For him a "thug life" is an acronym for the "the hate you gave little infants fucks up everybody." There's also an acronym for "niggaz." "I believe that, I've always discussed this. I feel like I'm one of them old-fashioned type of guys, where as soon as I find a women that doesn't mind the fact that I want to be in charge and that I believe that just like with the yin and yang there's a masculine and feminine. I believe in that in a relationship. I believe that most of our problems as black people and as period, as people in general, is that we've forgotten our roles. The men have forgotten their roles as men, therefore, the women have forgotten their roles. And that's where we get all this duplicity in lovemaking and duplicity in sexuality is because we've forgotten our roles and we're willing to settle for less. Not that they're not legitimate with people who really do like this style, but a lot of it right now is just, 'Niggas ain't shit, so I want some pussy,' you know what I mean?"(2) MIM does not agree with that, because the root problem is the imprisonment rate and the early death of Black men relative to wimmin and white men. However, the quote shows that 2Pac does not intend to be calling all wimmin bitches. Notes: 1. http://www.hitemup.com/tupac/interviews.html 2. http://v037182.km0805.kasserver.com/His%20Life/Interviews/interview%20tupac_on_women.htm ; also, http://tupac_a_shakur.tripod.com/id288.htm 2Pac "Nu-Mixx Klazzics" Death Row Records 2003 We're not too hot on this album, a remix of old 2Pac songs. It's too perfectly lumpen--lumpen with insight, but still lumpen. Gangsta consciousness is not the worst thing in the united $tates, and most music is worse, but this album cannot rate more than 50% in our book. In the classic "All Eyes on Me," 2Pac foreshadows a lot of the simpler rap that came after him talking about gangster life, chasing big money and regarding wimmin as "hoes." It's the same in "Ambitions as a Ridah" and "Life Goes On," where he talks about the death of his friends and how his small group of friends, "My niggahs, we the last ones left." In "All Eyes on Me, 2Pac says: "Say money bring bitches, bitches bring lies/ One niggas getting jealous, and muthafuckas died." There's a lot of truth to what he says, but it points no where and MIM is not into celebrating lumpen identity. The CD jacket by "Death Row" is all about 2Pac's professionalism, his attractiveness to wimmin and his bloody fights with other artists. It does mention the politics, but calls it "other targets" when 2Pac disses Clinton and Dole. By the lyrics, "Death Row" is right too, because 2Pac in "How Do You Want It" is criticizing someone named C. Deloris Tucker as worse than Clinton and Dole, so even there the politics is not the focus in the middle of a song about sex. C. Deloris Tucker was a Black womyn trying to attack "gangsta rap." Connected to that, in a song not on this album titled "Wonda Why They Call U Bitch," 2Pac explained why he calls some hoes "bitches." "It's like your mind don't understand/ You don't have to kill your/ Dreams plotting/ Schemes on a man/ Keep your head up, legs closed, eyes open." 2Pac suggested going to college to get rich instead of trying to hook up with a rich man. At MIM we do not agree with calling all wimmin "bitches," but the song leaves open that wimmin could change and not be bitches. The problem of "hoes" is capitalism. It's a system relating money to sex and it's not just a lifestyle choice solved by keeping one's legs closed. Under communism there won't be any hoes anymore.