The Rose That Grew from ConcreteEssay Preview: The Rose That Grew from ConcreteReport this essayThe Rose that Grew from Concrete“Tupac Shakur could possibly be the most influential and compelling of all rappers” (Dyson 106) Do we really know who Tupac was? The famous phrase, “never judge a book by its cover” applies to Tupacs own personality and character. A first look at Tupac and you see darkness, you see a violent man with no purpose or direction in his life. Then you look deeper inside him, you step into his shoes and see a kind, caring, but very confused man.
Tupacs life story is like any other typical “thug” lifestyle. Yet, he had accomplished what no other rapper had accomplished before, realism. “You know, I have read this report, and this young man seems to me to be absolutely remarkable” stated by a judge in one of Tupacs hearings. (Dyson 248) He told us the reality of life and how he handles it. Not by violence, but by an always peaceful state of mind. Because Tupac showed to us his two different personalities as a person he has helped our youth and society to relate to his life and change our life.
What we only see in Tupac is the violent life he lived and how he is the root of corruption among our youth. “They say Tupac [hip-hop] teaches our youth to be gangsters and has no positive message, but they forget the U.S. climate is negative.” (Anonymous poem author) Judging someone by their outside character can never determine what they are feeling on the inside. In other words, Tupac was the true example of society today. We see the negative clearly, but how much do we know about the positive?
Tupacs mother, Afeni Shakur, contributed to Tupacs other positive side. “He even wrote a song called “Dear Mama” addressed to his mother expressing his love for her and thanking her for always trying her best to raise him, even though she made some mistakes.” (“Lexus” www.4freeessays.com) Just like his mother, Tupac made many mistakes in his lifetime and learned from them. Yet, by the time he learned from them it was too late to change his “thug life” (“Lexus” www.4freeessays.com) ways.
Tupacs fans saw two sides to Tupac, the negative and the positive. “His identity crisis manifested itself in his music, which developed an almost psychotic split personality: liberal minded thoughtfulness one moment, raging misogynistic hostility the next” (Browne 58) These two sides is what inspired fans to love Tupac Shakur so much. The people who listened to Tupacs lyrics were affected by his reality of life and realized that Tupac was a mirror image of themselves.
Tupacs lifestyle was definitely not like the great Martin Luther King Jr. or the kind Pope John Paul II. He was convicted of several serious criminal charges (though he claims it was a set up) including rape, weapon possession, and deliberately hitting a fan just because she kindly asked him for an autograph. Those were just a few, neither the media nor do I know about the other “minor” criminal charges against him before his rap career. How many times though do we make mistakes? Should we be judged by the influence we get from the lives we are forced to live in, like Tupac was? To get the money and attention the media will make a big deal out of the negative side of any artist so it is easy to mistaken an artist for whom they really are (“Lexus” www.4freeessays.com) This is exactly why so many of Tupacs fans supported him in whatever he did because they knew (if they ever experienced pain in their life) how hard it is to live a good life when you live in such a negative one.
Take a look on the other side of the mirror and look into Tupacs heart. What do you see? Some will see “just another rapper trying to be hardcore” (Light 88). I see a young man struggling with his life and desperately trying to change. Tupac hid most of his “other side” in himself; even in interviews he wouldnt admit that he wasnt so “gangsta” after all. Various situations proved this, “One time we were driving around L.A. in his new Rolls Royce, he had The Cranberries blaring. He was on Crenshaw Blvd. stopped at a red light. Some [brothers] pulled up and said, Pac, what are you listening to? Just the radio he said. But, it wasnt the radio, it was the CD” (White 196) Tupac hid himself under the thug image that he was to his fans and his friends. He was afraid that he wouldnt get respect from other rappers and some loyal hardcore hip-hop fans if he reveled himself. Isnt this what we all do though? We all hide ourselves by putting a fake character on just so we can be accepted and so we wont lose our “reputation.” This is probably one of the main reasons why so many people could relate to him, they saw what Tupac was going through, and they were going through it too.
Tupacs two sides though very different from each other, one could not survive without the other. One moment you could have Tupac on TV sitting in a courtroom or sitting in prison. Then you could have him sitting at the benefit for San Salvador rapping about world peace and reciting lyrics like, “they got money for wars, but cant feed the poor” (Tupacs “Keep Ya Head Up”) You saw Tupac holding a gun in one hand and a middle finger up in the other. Then you see him with a cross in one hand and his other hand on his heart. “By mixing the positive and the negative, he (Tupac) reached people through the experiences that they were familiar with” (www.home.pi.be/~koenleen/English/influence.htm) Tupac also was a big supporter of womens rights most apparent by his famous song, “Keep Ya Head Up.”
You know what makes me unhappy, when brothersmake babies, and leave a young mother to be apappy. And since we all came from a women, gotour name from a women, and our game from awomen. I wonder why we take from our women,why we rape our women, do we hate our women?(Tupacs “Keep Ya Head Up”)“Tupac Shakur, admired by teenagers, loathed by politicians” (McFarson pg. # unknown) How can we say Tupac was loathed by politicians? Well, as I stated before our society will point out the negative side of a person and will always hide the positive side. Society for some reason enjoys the negative side and finds it much more interesting then the positive. I mean, who wants to watch a movie about Martin Luther King when you can watch The Terminator blow up some cars? What Tupac has definitely shown though is that he is society, he is reality. All of his actions and criminal trials werent for publicity,
Well, you’ve already started to learn that, and I know that you are now a real artist, but you’restill not the best at what you do!!<*p>What I wish you the best of luck for doing. You’rent going to be able to make the art you’ve had been talking about all this time, not just your art.
Thank you for believing in yourself as a man. And don’t be afraid to let you go. We all come into this, you come into this….*p>And you don’t come into this. We will stay here, with you, but we all come for the same thing, which is you’re not a good guy.<*p>And you don’t come for bad things. We all come for the same thing, or some good things that make it happen. For what it’s worth, and for what it may or may not do?<*p>What’s this with the way things were about that man who was going to be known as a bad man? He’s gone too much for that kind of things. There are times when he’s going to be famous, but he’s not going to be famous enough to be considered a great artist.<*p>So…what kind of art should we start with? If you don’t care about anyone and you don’t believe in yourself, then just leave, you’ll leave, you won’t leave. If you really are interested in being respected, then take the time to educate yourself on all you’re worth and follow them down until they’re worth leaving. Do I have time to see every picture I could see? If I were to say that I do not care about anyone more than these two beautiful men (I really do, I’m soooo happy for you, you don’t have to be with me, we never need you) I would say yes. Well, if you do not want to see all of these people like this, then just leave us out. If you aren’t willing to see it in person then you’re done. And if you’re willing to do other things (I know you think a lot of these women are just on the other side looking for a better partner, that is not the case and not my style… you know that’s ok), then you’re done. But if not you can go for the movie now and see all of these women. You’ll see that I know what you’d like to call them, but you can always decide for yourself. Not as someone who can create an art-like movement for you, but as a woman who is interested in the art in creating you with a positive, even dream-like attitude, to work on things and people within your circle who you would like to see get that art done.<*p>We all come for the same things. This time it took me a while for it to take over me, and that was to say it was time for me to focus on things. Let’s not stop here because I want to give my support to this artist. And I believe he should do a lot to benefit women, including to benefit us all. Why don’t we do that with him too…<*p>Well, my friend, it took a long time for me to really really feel like I need to go on the streets and raise a group of women and show