There's a kewl "graphic" of Tupac Shakur with a "creative" use of a portion of his lyrics taking up a whole half page in the back of The Daily Illini's Sports Section (Wednesday, September 17, page B-8 ). "The power of rhyme: 'All eyez still on Tupac...in a different context" it is hookingly titled. Enter a platoon of university experts and assorted influence professionals, doing their jobs, and abuzz with a sudden "interest" in good ol' Tupac Shakur, son of DESPISED Black Panther revolutionaries, very charismatic, and murdered, along with his body-guard, in a much more suspicious way than "gang-related shooting" lets on.

Sources I've found, just in passing (not being too inclined towards Tupac, myself, admittedly) have gone to great lengths to expose quite open police complicity; but perhaps the "nice" staff writer student, Jason Williams (or his managing editor) *meant* the Cop Gang versus the radicalized Black Folks "gang" (no extrapolation, however, as expected).

"Tupac's rap lyrics and poetry are now being studied in a number of universities across the nation for their social significance," the article states. What is going on here?

You can easily figure that the staff writer is only talking about kewl professors and eager students, innocently wanting to better understand more clearly and in an abnormally thoughtful way, what Tupac Shakur was seeking to speak and be. This is probably part of the truth. But, again, the staff writer doesn't extrapolate.

Let's fast-forward to one reality about universities: They are businesses and they are there to reproduce the dominant social order because their owners and directors are members of this order themselves. Is this a kindly, caring institution? We're taught to believe that it is. Is there an actual record that shows different? I'll let you think about that one for yourself. (But don't forget Noam Chomsky's analysis of university education politics, nor the well-documented collusions of university officials with once-illegal covert political police activities-duh!)

Another reality about university interests is that they are set up to study us. Do you think this could be a benign study, given the truths above? What would influence professionals, interested in upholding the dominant social order (namely, you shutting up and going to work like a "good, obedient citizen" want from doing such a benign thing as "studying" a charismatic and deeply-radicalized dissident? Surely they don't even CARE about him! Surely they're much more interested in helping to solve the population's burgeoning social ills! Right?

The reality is that not only do "experts" and other influence professionals (in the university and not) work hard to "study" dissent in this world, they also wish to contain and re-write our history. Look at any highschool history textbook, so watered-down and hollow of any really meaningful content that young people are often **poisoned** from caring to explore history's most celebrated authors, and end up focusing their attention on the more encouraged popular teen media (so superficially snazzy and "glamorous" in its pursuit of the teenage market). Not too different really, from the way the rest of the population is encouraged to passively consume sports.

Now, here's Tupac, being discussed in the Sports Section!

"The most prestigious universities in the nation have been among the earliest to catch on." But, earlier, at a central and well-known hot-spot of dissent, UC Berkeley, a grass-roots-styled proposal had to be fought for as "the University was unconvinced of Tupac's literary and social significance and denied [the Urbana high school teacher's proposal."

On the one hand these other more-major Ivy League universities have been already quietly "studying" Tupac, and on the other, a center of rabble-rousing tells a seemingly naive small-town teacher that no one is interested!

The difference is, the more major Ivy League universitis are set up to educate future policy makers and elite implementers. Tupac's 'stuff' is "too advanced" for young people, whom haven't "even heard" of Nelson Mandela, these days, as Cassiette West-Williams, an Urbana High School teacher points out. So that's an interesting insight, and shows a current that is happening that a lot of people don't think about.

How about this other one, where Tupac's 'stuff' is "too advanced" for young people because they haven't even heard of Nelson Mandela! (what a criterion, eh?)

It's strange because in the 1980s there was a huge, rap-inclusive push against anti-apartheid, including broad rap star participation, with a desire to release Mr. Mandela from prison in the center stage. How can that be that kids don't know about even him? Why would those slick Teen Culture mags (and not to mention MTV) that kids' attentions are hooked by not inform them???

What's Going On?!!!!? Could it be a "conspiracy" of shared interests? No! Absolutely NOT! Coercive authority **likes** Tupac Shakur too, so we're all in this TOGETHER, and "we" all want to be "helpful" to you strangely thinking fellow citizens...

One way that these shared interests work best is when their implementers latch onto untamed spirit and MINE it for all it's literally worth! They are engaged in the routines in which they are PAID and RECEIVE REWARDS for. They are getting ahead of dissent and rebellion and seeking to CONTAIN it, water it down, and re-write history.(1) If they avoid being "team players" then they won't be rewarded, and they will actually be punished.

As you read the article, you will see how the FIRE of Tupac is being re-directed into a more "nice" and "accessible" space. How this SPIRIT is contained by concepts we don't collectively think a lot about very much (and certainly anything we're consistently encouraged to read doesn't discuss!). Take the following:

"He was able to articulate problems with humanity...problems with black pain. When you can articulate pain, you invite people in an it helps to heal them." [emphasis added] This quote is containing by doing a little therapeutic ju-jitsu. The pain is in people, no mention of society's routines; healing (and adapting) can take place with "articulation".

Or:
"...to study what it is to grow up, to be impregnated as a teen...[to experience] incest [and] teen pregnancy and he breaks it all down" even though, in conclusion to the article, he "was just getting started." Smells very convenient here; fitting cleanly within popular conceptions of these selected topics-topics that "can be understood" by you 'stupid masses' as you're called by elites. (2)

How about the topic of 'race war'? THIS will bring up a "CAN OF WORMS"! Especially since the Black Community (the formalized leadership, that is) has been working so hard to contain Black dissent within quite weak awareness. Yeah, 'race' and 'racism' and how this aspect of valid critique keeps people divided, ghettoized, alienated from thinking about and mobilizing towards the actual HEART of the problem: Why and how ignorance and alienation keep cropping up in myriad forms!(3) In conclusion, the article, like any other serving the general university student (and erstwhile high school) population makes it appear like professionals want to have a harmony with ordinary folks. And they go to great lengths in sustaining that picture, while engaging in all sorts of sleight of hand. Anyone wishing to not be 'played' as the rap culture slang goes, may wish to inquire more deeply into this phenomenon.

"Disco Chuck" is an old-school 'home-boy' from Michigan, who grew up dancing with Black folks to the Sugar Hill Gang and Shalamar. Reach "Disco Chuck" via the Unbridled Artist Network at: intheheart2@ziplip.com (if mail 'bounces' keep trying)

Notes
1) See Reginald Major's expose "Stealth History" in The Black Scholar Volume 24, #4, Fall 1994, pages 39-45, where he discusses the phenomenon as far as the Black Panthers are concerned.

2) For insights into the way elites look at we rabble/"stupid masses" see: Public Opinion by the highly regarded Walter Lippmann, as well as Harold Lasswell, Reinhold Niebuhr, Wilbur Schramm, and others. The despised Noam Chomsky goes to some length in discussing these 'reputable' scholars in is institutional analysis. See for example: www.intheheart.net/Chom1.html

3) For additional insight on this reality, see Venomous Butterfly's article on feminism and gender, and read between the lines! (especially in the first few paragraphs) www.geocities.com/kk_abacus/vb/wd8fem.html