Tupac Shakur 1994 Exclusive Interview With Ed Gordon

You know, what I'm saying is that it's that situation where we live in a war zone, it's not that easy since these people are making a fuss, that if you just have some criminal black kids with guns, it's not like that. We live in hell, we live in the gutter, we're stacked 80 deep in a building. You know, when you leave your house, you strap it on to protect yourself because you live in the same community if the police carry rifles and riot gear. saying they need them, of course, excuse my language, I'm so sorry, the same reasons why they need the right hat, the right jacket, the bulletproof vest, the double vest, the nine millimeter Glocks with extra bullets, the tear gas , the mace, everyone, who do you think the police are?

He's using that against the dogs, so we fight the same villains they fight in the street, but instead of being seen, Martin Bill is in the street, all of us, we are your generation, the one who picks up where they left off. the Panthers, saying, "It's okay." Enough is enough, the generation before us forgot about the fight, we are taking it back, not only did they forget about the fight, they forgot about us, yes, and we are taking it back, but at this level, everything we are trying to to do is come together and right now, as a year, we have a million people that are listening, now we can tell them something, now we can try to do them that way and we could lose them, we could gain something, but we would never have had that audience if we hadn't said what it was.

It's real, you know what I'm saying and the main thing we have to remember is that the same criminal element that white people fear, black people are afraid of the same criminal element that white people fear, we fear, so we defend ourselves from the same crime. element that they were afraid of, you know, I'm saying why they waited for the legislation in the past and everything that we are next to the murderer, we are next to him, you know, because I get into projects with 80 in the building, all those murderers than letting them out right there in that building, but it's better that way because we black people get along with the murderers or something, we get along with the rapist because we're black and we're the same, what do we need protection for finally I want to ask you? about something someone else asked you in the

interview

and I thought the answer was interesting because I think it speaks a lot about you and your generation someone said where do you see Tupac in ten years?

You said hey, I just want to be alive, that's real. to you that's so real I can't I made a metamorphosis I'm a new person today because I used to be strong and I honestly honestly feel like I could represent my generation a lot because I honestly didn't care if I lived or died but now I can't die with people thinking I'm a rapist or a criminal. I can't make it clear. You know I'm not suicidal. I'm not. I can not go. Let's see, really know what time it is and after. That boom is over and we could see it before, but that's how it is and the reason is because if I can't live free if I can't live with the same respect as the next man I don't want to be. here because God has cursed me to see what life should be like if God wanted me to be this person and be happy here he wouldn't let me feel so oppressed he wouldn't let me feel so downtrodden you know what I'm saying he wouldn't let me think the things I think, so I feel like I'm doing God's work.

You know, I say it just because I have nothing to go through for people to put money in the bucket, it doesn't mean I'm not doing God's work. I feel like I'm doing God's work. You know, I say this because these ghetto children are not children of God and I don't see any missionaries passing through there. You know, I say it. I'm doing God's work while Reverend Jackson hangs out with the middle class and goes to the right house and dine and pray for the president. I'm in the hood, you know, I'm saying I do my job with my parents and just because I don't live dead I mean, I don't go there, I have to go there because I can't hang out anywhere else, what would a veteran of Vietnam without a sergeant, without backup, without any other soldier, anyone but a Vietnam? vet in Vietnam when he came, what would he be like and that's me?

I had to go through all that street warfare, all the same drugs that everyone else turns out with, you know where they would have stopped me in my tracks, I made it through and this is where I am but because I made a pass I missed some lessons you know what I am saying and you can see the lessons that I'm missing when you talk to me you can see where I haven't had a father when you talk I, you know, what I say, you can see where I spent a lot of my time in the streets when you talk to me because the words that I said , I know they are words that come from the mouth of a mother or the mouth of a father, they are words that come from the mouth of a pimp or a prostitute or a scammer or a drug dealer, you know, what I'm saying, but For me these were my role models, how much of that?

Although in terms of growing up without a father, sometimes not being with your mother, do you regret it? and I look back and I say damn, I missed something big, everything, um, I know for a fact that if I had a father, how to have someone and I hate to say this because people love to hear black people talk about this, But if I had a father, I had some of these opportunities. I could have helped my mother more. She wouldn't have followed the path she took. She could have been a better son. You know, I'm saying she wouldn't have gone down that path.

It was the absence of my father you know what I'm saying I'm dealing with him being a dad not being there my mother is dealing with him getting my man not being there you know so many problems in our community that it affects everything so I don't have that Never. I want to hear nothing about any kind of relationship between a black man and a black woman. I knew they didn't work because, as far as I knew, my dad was the coolest guy ever and my mom was a panther, so dating works. It doesn't work that's how I felt you know what I'm saying and going out there don't you say it's like watching my mother just go through changes and everything it's like my mother is my partner she's a soldier you know she's a soldier like I'm a soldier, You know, I've seen the game she went through repeated.

If she had gone to tell me when my mother went, if she hadn't done her route and shown me which way she went wrong, my mother always told me. Yo, never volunteer for our people because they will use you, that's what they do. You know, I'm saying that she never, she also told me to follow my heart and be the leader, but it's interesting to see. just the change in your face your reaction your thought process that's all I ever wanted did you ask my mom? She wanted to go to university. I went to school all the way and was ready to go to college.

The only thing that stopped me was money. When we packed everyone up, all the kids at my school were writing college applications. I had no life, so knowing that you and I need my mom's guilt, you know what I say when I think about that. I'm not speaking for myself, I'm speaking for my family, I pay all the bills, you know, I'm saying I feed my whole family poorly, okay, I do it and I can't stop it, you know, I'm saying, if throwing is going to make me gave a million dollars because he just got me pregnant, that's what I have to do constantly and if it makes me feel because right now I feel satisfied, I don't feel like I've ever embarrassed myself or my people, you know, and nothing.

I've done it and you know, I have the theory of the whole world. You know, I'm saying I'm 23 years old and I weigh 160 pounds. You know, I haven't even started. I haven't even written my plan yet and they freaked out. I got the vice. president Know who I am the president, every cop in every city knows what I'm saying and I haven't even started working on a plan. I have something to offer the business that hasn't been shown before. You know I have all this energy. That represents not only the black youth but the white youth, the Mexican youth, you know, I'm saying that that changes right before you go from being 18 and being irresponsible, so when you go to being 21 22 and the world whole on your shoulders, I think. strongly that my audience empathizes with me because I showed that side, I showed that raw, uncut emotion, good and bad, and that's why I think I can bring more fun, more script-driven, more albums producing, managing, you know, what I say yes I can.

I figured out how to control it. I can use it on many different levels. I tripped because it happens out of nowhere, it just works, you know, everyone screams, you know, I feel uncomfortable and it's like. It's like he's similar to a deer caught in the headlights. I freeze. You know, I don't know what to do. I don't know if I should be what they want me to be or if I should make them hate me. Me so they can stop, you know, say something bad so they can stop, but I'm also stuck in the middle of this because you can't.

I mean, no one could do that. The police can't do that. They can't stand up in front of all those people that we're controlling with a gun and a mace and all that, so for me with just words it's like a battle to find the right words to say at the right time. I'm curious to know when. You think about the idea that you have that kind of control over so many people and in a sense the idea of ​​being a role model comes up in the images and a lot of people who know you and who I spoke to beforehand suggested that Hey, you know that when you meet him, he will be something completely different from what you imagine and what the media is portraying.

What's up with that idea that you've been photographed? And sometimes I mean, to be honest, you like the representation of yourself, just, that's uh. That's right, don't tread on me, that's right, you're in trouble, that's right, but there's another side to you too. What's with that idea that you have to be able to figure out where you're going? For me it's like um. it's my sensitive side that um that likes to exploit the tough side because if my if I can if my image or my reputation can stop a confrontation before it happens I'm fine, you know, I'm saying, I know what the day is like- Nowadays it's a constant ego check of man in the industry of this world, so part of it is like you know, that's my resume, but as far as the media goes, they see it as something different, they don't care about my resume.

They don't care that I get in trouble, it's just another story, you know, and it's a real story, they don't have to pay for it and they'll make the most of it as far as people liking me when they do it for the first time. they come at me to humiliate me they want it to be that way and they do it just because they're afraid of me but I don't feel like that's my job to humiliate me to show them that I'm not right, I'm not a threat unless you're a threat to me you know what I say when people say when you meet the pop she is different from the years because when someone one on one someone one on one I honestly believe that I can speak I think I have the ability to reason I have logic I have compassion I have understanding if we talk there are no problems you know it's there but that's not what happens people use what they heard in the media and that's how they come to me and then you know we have a clash, one of the things you read in the media is that you are angry because you personify your generation, that you have some angry people out there and you are one of them.

Are you angry? Are you angry with what you see? Society is about. Yes, I am extremely angry. Confused. You know, many of the times I went to court I couldn't defend myself. You know, what I'm saying is that it was like that. It wasn't like the things they said about me were beyond my understanding or the things I could say weren't going to help my case, but because it was like I was exiled from society and that's how I feel. and all this anger comes from me being tired of waiting for my past to enter society.

All everyone did was make me and everyone around me feel more comfortable about where we were. You know, I'm saying about the places we stayed. us, this is our base of operations, let's build it, let's be happy with where we come from. You know, I say that instead of trying to digest it and get a key to access it, but you know, what I'm saying, don't say that everything has to be like this. separated, but we have to find pride in ourselves, you know what I'm saying and once you get to pride as a family, two seconds after the last, comes the anger at being held like this for so long and having to go through those changes what do you get. angry, you know, I'm saying that as soon as I think any black man gets his first three checks, he starts to get angry because it's not about the need to have a job and having to pay and having to do what you don't care about anymore. the smiles and you know, yes, master, because they didn't pay you, you know what I'm saying and now it's like you want to save money, you want to help other people, you see how far it is, how far you are.

I have to go help someone in your neighborhood. It's set up for me when they pay me to go out together. You know, I'm saying the only reason I've had these problems is because I'm not gone yet and these problems aren't. It doesn't come from a white man, it just comes from society. The problems that have left us, let me tell you this. A lot of people tell me that Pocket is mostly a good guy. There is a third thing, very goodfor record sales, which helps them identify. with the young people who are out there and angry and who would maybe label him a traitor like they did with Hammer, if he didn't have that heart, first of all, no one could call me a traitor.

I'm not, I'm not going. That's not even what I'm in for. I'm not looking for approval from the black community because we don't give approval, you know, we don't really do anything, but it exists, so it's not like I'm black. people might tell me you're a traitor or you're a true blue, you know, say it's not like I'm not even caught up in that, but I can see you know I'm saying the only thing we have in common as black people is We Share that poverty, so the thug side is closer to poverty than me being rich.

You know, how can I go to any community center? You know, I'm saying mess up a presidential Rolex, all these diamonds and say, look, we have to, yeah, but. Now when I say we, they know what I mean, I'm not saying I live in this neighborhood, none, but I'm a bully and they thought they can relate, I mean, you know, I say it when it comes. I'd like to say I'm real, they already know, hey, you know, I say it for me, for me, being me, not to push the darkness, but I know from the business that everyone in this business always whispers in your ear about what that you can't say well you can't do what you can't we're in this world and then this works two words why the black world the only thing I did was stand in the middle you know what I'm saying say I live in these, but I live in both worlds.

I can go out on the streets and survive and I can go out here and do my business. I play the role of devil's advocate again. Critics say yes, but they pimp you. Pimped out by record executives who will let you live your life as a thug because he betrays a certain black. I mean, you've heard it, yeah, that if you were just a singer you wouldn't have the same record contracts that you have, but because it portrayed the thug life, gangster rap, they allowed you to make that money, they allowed you to push and make platoon, I don't agree, yes, they said they are pinching me, that's true, but how about our woman?

I'm saying anyone should be pimped, you know, it's not that you have pimps, it's how long you wear the pants, you know, because if you really look at this situation, it's not me that's being pimped when you look at the white kids. write a sad song, it's the white people that are becoming pimps, you know, I say that because I'm making their future. I'm writing your syllabus right now. What I write in my I'll be too gay when it comes out in two months. that's what the white kids are doing so who's really getting pimps I'll be I'll be out when I'm writing my raps that's what the white kids gonna say today mommas and dads when they get home he's getting pimps you know I'm saying I'm a high school dropout you know I'm saying like my teacher told me when I was in high school I had to be you know I'm saying I just gotta move it's going down the other one said it's going down you know everything the world is being pimped whether you work at the five or if you work for yourself someone pimps you that's not that's not the clock the crime is how long do you allow yourself to get ten you have to go up everything has to get there everything is a struggle se start from the bottom working up to the top the press in the media makes you think that a black man who arms himself is illegal or criminal or that he wants to arm himself to rob a liquor store, you know, I'm saying that this is for me to defend myself and it should always be about just to survive, you know, and we have to be honest about the tools we use to survive and why a black life is more recoverable in a white life.

I know I'm saying we know they don't put in the same security and then they top that and the whites and the white neighborhoods, so for me to be here saying, you don't know? put down your weapons and no. violence I said that we are critics and if I didn't talk about violence everyone would act as if violence didn't exist. We, as rappers, brought that violence, we buy the violence that we have seen on the street and we put it on our records. we put in our records for years and after three four years people finally started to see it because all the statistics that are happening in the streets, if we stopped talking about it, then they wouldn't take statistics and when they stopped taking statistics, then they would be killing each other in the stream these white people wouldn't just care anymore they just reason they care because you know they've been some strays and we just slip into the white neighborhoods and it's the kids in Iowa that want to be like we You know, I'm saying it's the kids and in Indiana they're trying to be like us because they can relate to you.

You know, I'm saying that you even admitted that I don't live in that neighborhood anymore. There's no real reason for you to wear a nine. millimeter I don't believe that why and in two years the driver of my limousine pointed a gun at me the police, you all know, I'm saying and you better know, you know, I'm saying that I've been attacked, haven't you read the papers about these skinheads trying to blow up black churches. Wow, they see me as the enemy, just like you do. Do you know I'm saying you can come to my house and sit outside my house like anyone can ask in it and once my life is gone, no one can give it back to me, not the judge, not the president, not the governor, not Calvin , nor Jesse Jackson, came to my funeral and had a nice talk about How Black People Suffer, You Understand, and as far as Jesse Jackson goes, my first acting job was at the Apollo Theater when Jesse Jackson was running for president in 1984.

It hurts me that he says something negative about any rapper because we support him, he should support us. you know, I'm saying in terms of the image of him you know, I'm saying what he was, what he was doing, you know he should be the last person to talk about gun violence when he sat there while Martin Luther King got one in the neck. I know I'm saying things that really changed a lot. I swear to god. Nothing. I never said it's meant to be something where innocent people get hurt. Nothing. I never said it should be like endurance.

Let's do it right now. Nothing. Everything you ever did. I mean and if there is anything, this is something we could make clear. Anything I say in regards to my companions and being tied up is only in self-defense. You know, I say that because I'm in the world right now. It's hard and I just don't have beautiful stories, you know, you say I'm just going to be setting them up because that's why I think I was wrong if someone would have grabbed me and pulled me aside and looked surprised so soon. When you come out here, they're actually going to assume that I had explained it to myself, I wouldn't, I made the same mistakes, but I made those mistakes and now it's my job to stop someone else from making those same mistakes to expose them. to draw the real map of the world and what it would be like all I'm saying is a warning it's a plea to hell if everyone was like this I didn't care about myself why can't anyone help me you know what I'm saying I never wanted to be a star to to say that my job worries me about everyone, don't cheer me up, you know, I'm saying that if you're not cheering me up for what I'm doing, even if you cheer me up, don't do it.

Joy because you think I'm cute, you know what I'm saying, damn, that encouraged me for what I'm doing, for what I represent and when I go to jail you should cheer me up harder, you know what I'm saying because I'm defending what I do, it doesn't hurt I'm stealing from nobody I'm not stealing from anyone I never took anything everything I do I do it to represent my people I do it because I believe this is what they want me to do We kill each other because we kill ourselves We are not when a man when another man I know I've been in the position, no, it's out of our control, it's not like he wants to kill, he just doesn't want to die, you know, I'm saying it's that situation you have we're living in the war zone it's not that easy since these people are making a fuss he just caught some criminal black kids with guns ain't that we live in hell we live in the gutter You got an 80 stacked deep in a building.

You know that when you leave your house you are tied up, but to protect yourself because you live in the same community, the police carry rifles and riot gear saying they need them. my language I'm so sorry the same reasons why they need the right hat the right jacket the bulletproof vest the double vests the nine millimeter Glocks with extra bullets the tear gas the mace everyone who do you think the police are using that against dogs so we? fighting the same villains they fight in the street, but instead of them seeing us, Martin Bill is in the street, all of us, we are his generation, the one who picks up where the Panthers left off, saying it's enough, the generation before us.

We forgot about the fight, we're picking it up again, not only did we forget about the fight, we forgot about ourselves, yes, and we're picking it up again, but at this level, all we're trying to do is come together and now same, as a year, we have a million people that are listening now we can tell them something now we can try to convince them that where we lose them we could gain something but we wouldn't even add that audience if we hadn't said what was real, you know, what I'm saying and The main thing we have to remember is that the same criminal element that white people fear, black people are afraid of the same criminal element that white people fear, we fear, so we defend ourselves from the same criminal element that they fear.

I'm saying why did they wait for the legislation in the past and all we are on the side of the murderer, we are on the side of him, you know, because we are in the projects with 80 in the building, all the murderers that they are letting out, are there same on that. building but it is better because we blacks get along with murderers or something like that we get along with rapists because we are black and we are the same what do we need protection for finally I want to ask you about something that someone else asked you In the

interview

and I, the response was interesting because I think it speaks a lot about you and your generation.

Someone said: what will you see to appear in ten years? You said hey, I just want to be alive, that's real to you, that's so real. Can't I do a metamorphosis? I am a new person today because I used to do it loud and honestly. I honestly feel like I could represent my generation a lot because I honestly didn't care if I lived or died, but now I can't die and neither can people. thinking I'm a rapist or a criminal I can't make it clear you know I'm not suicidal I'm not I can't go let's see they really know what time it is and then after that boom it was all over and we could see it , you know, fall, but that's how it is and the reason is because if I can't live free, if I can't live with the same respect as the next man, I don't want to be here because God has cursed me. to see what life should be like if God wanted me to be this person and be happy here he wouldn't let me feel so downtrodden he wouldn't let me feel so downtrodden you know what I'm saying he wouldn't let me I think the things I think so I feel I am doing God's work.

You know, I say that because I have nothing to do with people putting money in the bucket, it doesn't mean I'm not doing God's work. work I feel like I'm doing God's work, you know, I say that because these ghetto kids are not God's children and I don't see any missionaries coming over there, you know what I'm saying, so I'm doing God's work well. Reverend Jackson associates with the middle class and goes to the White House and dines and prays for the president. I'm in the neighborhood. You know, I'm saying I do my job with my parents and just because I don't.

I live there I mean, I don't go here I have to go there because I can't