Ghetto Wars

When you can’t live
Where you want to live
When you can’t go
Where you want to go
Without someone coming up to you
And saying to you
There is a problem

Yeah
Ladies and gentlemen
Gotta let ‘em know
It ain’t the same out here
Yeah
I reassure you it’s not a problem right now
Check it
It’s story time

I like to go where I wanna go
Walk how I wanna walk
Dress how I wanna dress
Talk how I wanna talk
But this can get your boy
Outlined in chalk
Sitting in the mortuary
Life is at a halt
Another young brother’s life
Is smothered
For walking through the hood
Wearing the wrong color
The one who pulled the trigger
Didn’t know the other
Didn’t care about his mother
Or whethert she would suffer
At the grief of losing her only son
But this happens every day
He ain’t the only one
To get his life snatched
His homies didn’t like that

They loaded up them things
And came right back
Leaning out the window
With his gat
See in the ghetto
It goes tit for tat
Take one of mines
I’ll take one of yours
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars

And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
CIA brought drugs and guns
See whose pockets are full
With slugs and funds
Black man wants rights
We gonna fix you
But first I’m gonna hit ya
With this deadly mixture
And then I’m gonna wed your sister
Drag her through the mud
Get your momma hooked on drugs
And once you’re happy with the life you’re living
I’m gonna send you off to prison
After dong my bidding

And that’s the cycle
Of how your life goes
Here’s a role model
His name is Michael
Jordan, Jackson, not even Tyson

Let him live a little
Then I’m gonna ice him
Take his house, his cars, his nice friends
And this hat and his bank account
Is tantamount
Until he’s on all fours
That’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
Yeah
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars
And that’s how we got
Into these ghetto wars

To all my people listening
We gotta be smarter
Cause every day life
Is getting harder and harder
I wait for progress
Farther and farther
We just like sheep
Being led to the slaughter

Stop slowing down
Stop guilding
Stop self-destructing
Start building
Stop adding to the senseless killing
And pray
And make a better way for you and your children

Gain esteem
Pay yourselves attention
Open up a business
Be self sufficient
Be a scientist
A doctor, a lawyer
We got enough LA Lakers
And Georgetown Voyers
Or entertainers who
Don’t believe us
When you need a future leader
So he can lead us
Be there for theirs
So you’ll be for yours
And that’s how we break from these ghetto wars
Yeah
And that’s how we break from these ghetto wars
And that’s how we break from these ghetto wars
And that’s how we break from these ghetto wars
Yeah