The person l'm going to talk about next is a person who's very dear to me.
A person who is a second-generation revolutionary.
So please help me in welcoming brother Tupac Shakur.
First, l want to say peace to my mother.
She's not here, but I gotta give peace. l wouldn't be here if it wasn't for her.
And l looked on the front of this thing, and it says, "Start from within to rebuild our original greatness", right?
OK, well that's what my mother did.
And l'm listening about
freedom fighters and strugglers.
Well, you got to understand
that when it was in to have a gun
and to be in the street,
my mother gave that up to be
in a house and wash the dishes.
You know? And feed us.
And put the thoughts in our brains.
Because we didn't get
any of that history
from all of those
soldiers that we lost.
We got none of that. They all
went to jail, if you can remember.
They all went to penitentiaries.
We didn't see
none of that knowledge.
And if it was not for my mother,
who stayed home
and didn't go out and do all that,
then l wouldn't have had shit.
Excuse my language,
but l wouldn't have been nowhere.
So what l'm going to do,
hopefully, is l want to be...
Not, "I want to be",
l am Tupac Shakur.
l have to be a reminder
that we can't chill out.
lt ain't time to cool out, and banquets
and all that. lt's still on.
lt's on like it was on when you
were young, and you want to say,
"Fuck that" just like you said,
"Fuck that" back then.
How come now that l'm 20 years old,
ready to start some shit up,
everybody's telling me
to calm down? You know,
''Don't curse, go to school,
go to college.''
Well, fuck that! You know,
we've had colleges for a while now.
And it's still Brendas out there,
and niggas are still trapped.
You know what l'm saying?
And it gets me irked.
Because l understand
that it's not going to stop.
You know what l'm saying?
it's not gonna stop until we stop it.
And it's not just white men
that's doing this to Brenda,
and it's not just white men
that's keeping us trapped.
lt's black!
You know what l'm saying?
We have to find the New African
in everybody, in all of us.
Because if we keep running
around looking for black
and who got the most colours on
and who got the baddest dashiki on,
we're still going to get,
excuse my language, fucked!
Because it irks me that my mother
right now is going through,
you know, she has to get clean.
This is somebody who l watched
travel the whole country...
...during the time when
women were scared
to speak up for the Black Panthers.
She spoke at Harvard,
Yale, everywhere.
And now l see my mother
as what's really going on.
And l don't see no big parades
around my mother now.
And she doesn't got a dozen fucking
awards, and l don't see nobody there.
You understand what l'm saying?
So about all this, l take that lightly.
l take all this lightly.
What l want you to take seriously
is what we have to do for the youth.
Because we're coming up
in a totally different world.
This is not the same world
that you had.
This is not the '60s. This is not that.
We grew up B.C., Before Crack.
That should say it all.
You understand?
We did not grow up without parents.
You had parents that told you,
''This is what went on back in the day.''
Now you don't have that.
You have young kids, 1 4, coming
home, their mama's smoking out
or doing it to their best friend
to get the product.
So that means that it's not just
about you taking care of your child,
it's about you taking care
of these children.
Because that's what's out here today.
You understand what l'm saying?
And it hurts. lt hurts that l gotta...
lt bothers me, not ''hurts''.
lt bothers me that l have
to sidestep my youth to stand up
and do some shit that somebody
else is supposed to be doing.
You understand? There's too many
men out here for me to be doing this.
Because it ain't my turn yet.
l'm supposed to be following him,
getting knowledge.
l don't got a chance
to get the knowledge.
l can't go to college.
There's too much problems out here.
l don't got the money. Nobody do.
So, what l'm saying is, it's not as
easy as we're mapping it out to be.
And we've got to stay real.
We've got to stay real.
Before we could be New African,
we've got to be black first.
We've got to get our brothers from
the street like Harriet Tubman did.
Why can't we look at that
and see exactly what she was doing?
Like Malcolm did. The real Malcolm,
before the Nation of lslam.
You got to remember,
this was a pimp.
The pusher and all that,
we forgot about all that.
ln our strive to be enlightened, we
forgot about our brothers in the street,
about all our dope dealers,
our pushers and our pimps.
And that's who's teaching
the new generation.
Because you all are not doing it.
l'm sorry,
but it's the pimps and the pushers
who's teaching us!
You got a problem
with how we was raised,
it's because only they could do it.
They're the only ones who did.
While everybody else wanted
to go to college and, you know,
''Everything has changed'', they were
telling you the white man ain't shit.
''Here you go.
Check this out, young blood.
''You take this product,
you switch it, make money.
''That's how you beat the white man.
You get money, you get the hell out.''
Nobody else did that. l don't want
to hear shit about nobody telling me
who l can't love and respect
until you start doing what they did.
You understand?
To me, this is Mecca.
This is the black family l see here.
But what makes it even
that much more sadder,
what makes me want to cry,
is because soon as l leave here,
so does Mecca.
You understand what l'm saying?
We're going back to the real deal.
Out there, you're gonna see
them sisters and Brenda.
They right out there.
And you all are going to get
in your cars and drive the fuck home.
You know what l'm saying?
l'm sorry. l apologise.
l apologise, but check this out.
You can't be no more offended by
my cursing than what's really going on.
That's real. That's real.
That's real.
You all got to really be true to that,
be true to that.
Because we're letting the media
and the white man cut us off.
You let them tell you
the rappers ain't real,
and you've got to either be,
you know, the intelligent person
or you're a gutter person.
We're all the same!
We all feel it like you all feel it.
l just can't hold a straight face
when l see it.
This is proof that
we can be together.
The young black male
is the future of us!
And the young black sister
is the future of us!
lt's going to be what you put into it.
So if you don't put shit into it,
don't get mad when we blow up.
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