“Heaven Sent”

Over the past year and throughout this election people all over the nation especially people of color have had in impeccable amount of hope that has been given to them through the eyes of change and the election of former President Elect and now Mr. President Barack Obama.

President Obama has had an effect on us all and especially the urban hip-hop community. This historical moment has been something that we as young adults never thought we would see in our lifetime. It is a great thing to look up at the highest position possible and see that a man of color earned this position and we now have our first ever black first family.

Over this time span many artists have come out with songs of hope from Nas and his self penned “Black President” to Will I Am and his song featured when Obama won the Election “ A New Day”, to Atlanta’s own Yung Jeezy and his hit “My President is Black”, which was remixed by Jay-Z during the Inauguration. In the remix of this already hot song Jay says some things that are well profound in the urban community and we can all identify to as a nation. With all of these versions of songs and different antics from artists all over honoring our 44^th president of the United States, the question that I ask to all of you is Are we ready for a black President? Tupac Shakur one that was before his time told us in his song “Changes” he stated :

I see no changes/ all I see is racist faces
misplaced hate/ makes disgrace to races
We under/ I wonder what it takes to make this
one better place, let's erase the wasted
Take the evil out the people/ they'll be acting right
'cause both black and white/ is smokin' crack tonight
and only time we chill/ is when we kill each other
it takes skill to be real,/ time to heal each other

And although it seems heaven sent
We ain't ready, to see a black President.

Yes it is true that he has already been elected into office but there are so many different views on him already. Granted they have not been able to find any dirt on President Obama there are already all types of accusations about him and his leadership abilities circulating on the Internet. One rumor is that he is the Antichrist, Crazy right, but people really believe in that. I have seen you tube videos of people talking about it and they sound just plain ignorant. Why would they say that though? Is it because he is a man of color that captivates people when he speaks and makes us feel his words, or perhaps it’s the fact the he exudes great confidence or in our language killa swag!! Who knows but what I want to know is if he was a white man with that same attitude and confidence would the same thing be said about him?? Another thing that bothers me is during this holiday season there were Christmas ornaments that were being sold across America of the President taking a shit!! Now what kind of disrespectful crap is that!! Then we have the commercials of a coin already being sold with Obama on it that is on television every two minutes, not to mention the meaningless conversations that I have had with white people who want to congratulate me every time they see me!! I didn’t run for President and win so why are you shaking my hand? Would you have shook my hand any other time or just this time because you want me to think that you’re down and voted for Obama but you really voted for Mc Cain.

All of these different things to me are taking the attention off of the most important thing of all. This man is qualified for the job! Point blank period!! People are always going to have something to say negative about anyone who they feel can possibly bring some positivity back to the United States of America. Another thing that we must remember as proud people is that we have to allow President Obama to bring about change and what many people do not understand is that it takes time. It will not happen I repeat it will not happen overnight!! It will take some time. One thing that I have to say is that during this time he already has brought about some change in us for we are now going to be more aware of our surroundings and what is going on with our government. Little children of color can now believe in their aspiration of becoming president, young men in barber shops across America discuss what ‘s going on with the Senate and the congress instead of talking about how phat Shaniqua’s booty was in those jeans. Our community has been given a since of hope. To me I feel that this is something that we needed, to bring back confidence that was stripped from us years ago. It has in a way been reinstated to our community. It shows us that we can do it with hard work and everything we have fought for did matter. In my mind this moment is the strength being put back into us all as Americans not just Black Americans but all citizens of the United States of America!! It’s been about 14years since Tupac wrote and recorded the song “Changes” and what he thought would never be came true!!

With that being said I’ll leave you with what Jay said:

my president is black/ in fact he’s half white
so even in a racist mind/ he's half right
if you got a racist mind /youll be aight
my president is black/ but his house is all white
rosa parks sat /so martin luther could walk
martin luther walked/ so barack obama could run
barack obama ran/ so all the children could fly
ima spread my wings you can meet me in the sky

my president is black/ my mayback too
and ill be goddamned/ if my diamonds aint blue
my moneys dark green/ and my porche is light gray
im headed for dc/ anybody feel me

CTP wants to know how you feel about the election and about the President elect as well as the reaction from others around you in your community…Let’s Talk about it!!!

~Kristi Furrowh

Editor in Chief

CTP Magazine ATL