Human Element Lyrics

[Talib Kweli talking] The other day I was walking passing when you was on the way to meet my pops, you know, and this white boy stops me, talking 'bout, he be in the National Socialist something or other, trying to sell me a paper and, give me some, uh, Free Mumia pamphlets. So you know I'm in a hurry, right, and i told him, right, and he tried to check me, like 'Have you ever even heard of the Black Panthers, and Mumia was fighting so you could go to college, and...' All this, and I'm like, "dude, you don't even know me, man. I don't even fucking go here, man. I know who the fuck Mumia is, man. Innocent niggas get locked up every day, man. That ain't nothing new..." But, yo, on the other hand, you tell some brothers Mumia's on death row, and they think he's making records with Suge Knight. I don't know, man, I guess it just really where you at, you know what I'm sayin'...Bust it. [Talib Kweli] Niggas on the street running like slaves Trying to eat, yo, we averages Twenty one years from the graves, back to baby carriages The same hypocrites screaming pro-life and marriages Be using religion to justify our savageness 'How bad is this?' You and the creator need a mediator Your priest is human Your relationship with God is greater The men who think they hard Steady issuing death penalties The people got no right to life cause they all slaves mentally You turned'Thou Shall Not Kill' into a sham of a commandment Your interpretation I cram to understand it Like light So if America is majority white The the prison's another country like James Baldwin Blacks and latinos all in the system Like it's a calling to fall in the trap That's why our blocks are infested with drugs and gats In fact, cats on their throat cause the way they think is illegal One thing you can't forget when you're dealing with people [Chorus 4x] The Human Element (scratched) "Done somethings bad, done somethings good" [Tae] I done walked on these streets 24 revolutions Gon' start for play me more just from raw evolution Fucking up your system like P&D pollution Staten niggas free be in (?) institutions It's the term of the century Ohio got twenty seven penitentiaries 44,000 for each entity See a nigga on the street, snatch him instantly Here come the infantry, they shoot to kill intentionally word is you could be disturbed mentally Police balk, but that's business officially What you thought, they supposed to show sympathy We born enemies, they sworn to get ridda me Protect to serve, you gotta be kidding me Eventually, my conscious state made 'em contemplate The price of freedom is your life man you compensate Now think that all the way through, and let me commentate And every common state be seem to dominate And man accomodate laws they abominate Through bars to combinate And guards to confrontate Souls are irrevelant In cells like melanin Judge without intelligence Chorus 4x [Talib Kweli] My nigga starving in prison for bartering with ism You tell me which is civilization and which is barbarism He fell into the traps he knew was put here by the system Some people got the knowledge, but they never apply the wisdom If you ain't got it, then replicate it Or join the growing ranks of the ill-fated Slated to be publicly humiliated If you ain't the problem, then the solution you have to be We'll start a hoodlum intelligence agency like tragedy We majesty, stay focused with thought and meditation Deviling this Babylon with strength and dedication Like that, and we don't stop My A of life gon' remain on top It's the Reflection, and we got the sureshot And we only drop that pure hip-hop This goes out to freedom fighters, graffiti writers Innocent lifers, grassroots organizers This goes out to single mothers Soul bad brothers Young lovers of the revolution that solutions This goes out to cats raising babies The the ones who react, say, when the world get crazy Blaze one for the MOVE organization Ramona Africa, and those that know truth is liberation Chorus 2x Hi-Tek put it on 'em Free Mumia