(scroll to 1:30)

wow this is retarded, please don't tell me you actually believe this is true, or that 2pac is god or something now

maybe 2pac was just trying to be a sort of ghetto preacher, making the acronym of T.H.U.G, talking about praying even though from his actions he doesn't seem like a christian at all, making songs about a "ghetto heaven", maybe he just said this shit for the people in the ghetto.

Lol, those quotes are from the 'cracked' website, where they add a touch of humor to their articles. Hahaha, we all know that there aren't Buddhist monks on the moon. The first sentence in that post is very accurate, though.

If you are talking about that white man in the sky, yes, I see 2Pac as a greater figure than him. Personally, at least.

That's exactly what he was trying to be, as most rappers who come from the struggle. Hood reporters, if you will.

Yup that's also true, no argument there. Pac has said many times over he does this for everyone, rich kids and poor kids. But he understands that poor kids will react to his music differently than rich kids. He says it's ok for rich kids to hear THUG LIFE and enjoy it, because it is just entertainment for them. But the kids who really live a THUG LIFE, that is who he wants to reach also, so they can indentify with someone who goes through the same struggle they do. Pac was gifted in his ability to reach different groups of people, something especially difficult in the realm of rap.

http://www.pbs.org/saf/1310/teaching/teaching.htm

Seriously bro, you argue like the Islamic guys who debated Dan Barker. You provide false and/or exaggerated information and then blow it up as if they are absolute facts and then use it to make people like myself, who don't consider debate to be a sport with a winner or a loser, but rather a learning experience where facts are provided and fallacies are detected and discarded, look bad. Rather than arguing with someone and trying to come to a logical and true conclusion based on facts, you try to destroy the credibility of the person you are arguing with in order to "win". That is the lowest common denominator of argumentation and, frankly, it is childish.

my new theme song



erikboyd60@hotmail.com

"True poetry can communicate before it is understood"

-T.S. Eliot

battle record:

7-0-0

Please provide supporting evidence for this statement.

It goes both ways. A debate is a competition. Whether you choose to learn from it or not is beyond the point. I told you before, I deal with facts. And I stand by that.

Which I have up to this point. If I haven't, please, by all means, disprove me.

If there are holes in your argument, I will find them. It's not my fault that your debate skills are so bleek that it seems as if I'm "destroying your credibility", I'm just good at what I do. I know hip hop. I know 2Pac.

What's childish is you totally avoiding the evidence I gave you and instead directing your anger towards my style of debate. If you want to discuss mysticism and the supernatural, we can do that. But if I present information that is in direct conflict with your statements, don't get all sensitive because someone proved you wrong! You've done that throughout the entire course of this thread and it's as clear as day. You are bleeding with emotion. Ever since the second page you haven't been able to maintain your composure, and that's the reason this "argument" was so easy for me to conquer in the first place.

Let's start at square one. All you did was provide links that explain what Pyrokinesis is. Let's build from there. Are there any aspects of my previous posts on the monks that you would like to disprove? Start there.

No, I get it. You want to come back into the thread and throw your little effortless jab and then run away. I understand completely.

Explained what? That claims need to be backed up with solid evidence? I've done that and then some.

I know my shit. If you didn't want a debate, why quote my posts?

If I haven't been logical, please, disprove any of my claims you feel just in quoting.

If I haven't been logical, please, disprove any of my claims you feel just in quoting.

If I haven't been logical, please, disprove any of my claims you feel just in quoting.

If I haven't been logical, please, disprove any of my claims you feel just in quoting.

If I haven't been logical, please, disprove any of my claims you feel just in quoting.

Just in case you missed it the first few times...

I didn't make those words up. I didn't smear Menace's name by conjuring up that statement. I can provide factual proof that he actually said those words in that specific context. I have the link to the thread as well as screenshots so when you want confirmation, you just let me know.

Tell me about it.

You came in this thread after you said you were done, and accused me of relaying false information about monks being able to raise their temperature and drop metabolism to which Western science has yet to figure out a direct cause. I responded, kindly asking you to provide proof that any of my claims were bogus. Instead of focusing on that, you attack my style of debate. Then you go on to call me a sociopath. You are making yourself look bad right now. When you are ready to debate on a factual level, minus the name calling (name calling is cool with me too, but you've already shown that you can't handle that type of debate) then get at me. I ain't going anywhere. Since the thread was split this is MY thread now, and I'll hold it down until people stop posting in it. Get it? Got it? Good.

Added (26/Dec/09, 6:30 Pm)
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Here are a few of the quotes that Menace directed towards me. I don't want anyone to think that I am simply calling out his quote on Obama because I have anything against him personally. If you are gonna call me out of my name, expect the same lack of compassion when I direct similar sentiments towards you. Just being fair.

I guess i'll try and break the tension and direct the conversation back to Tupac.

A question that started to get me wondering was how many deeds does one have to do be labeled as a thug. What if all of the charges on 2pac were trumped up to make him look badder/cooler? What if 2pac committed no crimes, would you still consider him a thug by his self-proclaimed definition?

note the WHAT IF, this is hypothetical and in no way factual.

Also, do you think Tupac had a choice between being a thug or not? It seems on the outside looking in that he had plenty of wonderful opportunities at his disposal to avoid trouble and jail time but instead chose to embrace the thug persona, not that it's necessarily a bad thing just curious of your opinion on that.

I don't believe he necessarily chose to embrace the persona, it was something that came with the territory. Everything that 2Pac was and presented was an extension of himself. The good, as well as the ugly. When 2Pac moved to California, the only shelter that his family could afford was in one of the worst housing projects in the East Bay.

"You can't survive trying to be an angel, when you're living amongst devils. You'll be destroyed." - 2Pac

"Where I'm from, you either blend in or get touched" - 50 Cent

Pac was a lot more than merely a thug. Everyone with a brain knows this. But people tend to forget that the hood is not compassionate. If you don't protect your meal ticket, someone will walk up to you and snatch it out of your hands. In my opinion, 2Pac was doing what he needed to do to survive in that paralleled world known as the Ghetto. Sometimes you need to become a little more aggressive, sometimes you may need to do things you wouldn't necessarily do in your "right mind", but survival is the only absolute truth recognized in the hood. In layman's terms, you can't be a bitch. You can't portray the person who the next man thinks is soft, which would leave you vulnerable to everyone who catches the scent of fear, or doubt.

Pac ganered enough money to raise himself up out the hood, but like the old saying goes, "You can take the brotha out the hood, but you can't take the hood out the brotha" ... This is universally acknowledged, and helps give credence to the realization that blacks who come from poverty still do retarded shit when they reach financial success. Just think of all the popular black icons who have got caught up in some dumb shit. This isn't by error, it's systematic --If you force a human into the life of an animal, they will soon become one. And sometimes that is irreversible. 2Pac was the perfect example of this. A man who lived with a caste of contradiction, yet it was in that contradiction that his genius was shown. He was an angel with broken wings, as some liked to call him.

Regardless of the many opportunities he had and the chances he had to do this and that, we can't forget that 2Pac was human, and died way too young. Many people his age can't even tie their shoe laces right, and here he was, at 25, leading a cultural revolution while simultaneously ducking prison time, federal charges and contracted attempts on his life. Maybe he did pass up some avenues that would've led to a better life, but hindsight is 20/20, and Pac was living life in the fast lane.

Now, if we are debating off of pure fact, then you cannot say "Tupac was a thug" or "He wasn't a thug".
All definitions of the word and the idea of a "Thug" are naturally subjective and never are or will be "right" or "wrong".
You might be a thug to me, but to someone else you are a softie.
SO, I say we drop this argument. There is no right or wrong. There are simply points in between right and wrong, which may lean further towards the right or left.

He bowed in defeat like two pages ago lol, that argument has been done. Abanks posed a question and I was just responding. No ill regard towards him or the words in his post.

@ALCATRAZ: When threads explode like this one, and I'm not actually active in the argument, I start to ignore most of the posts because I just don't have the time or patience to read every detail unless I'm super interested. I'll skim read the previous 2 pages before it, but you know...
So yeah my bad..

No worries.

You know, if you don't feel like going back you can always request a quote bump ... I keep tabs of all important posts throughout the thread for that specific purpose -- reference. So let me know next time.

Added (26/Dec/09, 9:09 Pm)
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Trying to stay on topic with the last few pages, here's some more information on human mysticism...