Responsibility Is A Lifestyle: It's Time to Bury Da Beef

In a few weeks, I will begin a one-year prison sentence for being in the possession of illegal firearms. Where I come from, having a gun is just part of everyday life. But, through this painful process of going to court and being convicted, I realized that I had to make a change. I made some bad decisions. I broke the law and will accept my punishment. With deep reflection about where my life was headed, I have begun the process of redemption, and decided that before I go to prison, I want to speak to young people about responsibility as a lifestyle. I hope that through my mistakes, young people can begin to learn, as I did, that we have to put our guns down and start to give our guns back. It pains me inside to hear about so many of our people dying because of gun violence. Just in the past weeks, a 13-year old boy was shot in the head in Harlem, a 17- and a 19-year old were murdered in a double homicide in Queens and a 15-year-old was chased, beaten, shot and burned in Chicago.

We will gather today in Harlem, with many mentors and supporters by my side, including Rev. Al Sharpton, Russell Simmons, Kevin Liles, GlobalGrind.com, Political Swagger, Mobile Regime and the C.H.A.N.G.E. Initiative to share the message that now is the time. Now is the time to speak out against gun violence. Now is the time to take responsibility for our actions. Now is the time to make our communities safer. Now is the time to support good legislation, like the S.N.U.G. bill in NY. Now is the time to give back our guns. Now is the time for me to lead by example.

We can and we will do better.

-- T.I.

For more information on the "Responsibility is a Lifestyle: It's Time to Bury Da Beef" visit: TheKINGFoundation.com or text KING to 878787

Comments

[IGNSTHMD]

I was thinking about maturity today and it can find you in strange ways and times . Being black in the south I sure has been a big part of making you who you are and even how you will shape your life and times, god willing you can finish what you have started here; there is so much maturity that we have and can have that doesn't mean we have to hurt (each other) to have Just with time and grace to guide and leadership where it it is true. I want good things for black people, but I am scared sometimes at the way look past what we know is right what is ... You are right black people can progree on to taking our part in taking ownership for ourselves and each other. We are lucky to have such bright leaders like yourself. Please don't let this opportunity pass; let us see past hardship to our power of coice

Keep the faith

P.S. next drank redundant solidarity

[Ohioan730]

Break the conspiracy of silence. We have to let the police know who are the trouble makers in our neighborhoods. I don't know if they ever found the guys that shot up T.I.s SUV in Ohio and killed his friends but I'm willing to bet SOMEBODY knows exactly who did it. There are people out there who know what happened to 2Pac, Biggie and other non-famous people in the hood and they wont say anything because they don't trust the police to protect them and they fear retaliation. If everybody comes forward, this will end.

[keyskween]

I appreciate reading your responses because you sound like you know what you are talking about. Please keeping spreading the word. I work with students who tell me they feel like they have no future - like they will be dead before they are 24. These young men and women should not be treated like they are throw-away people. Obama gives us hope, but we don't know how to fight the evil - sometimes it seems too big to fight.

[deja669]

Great Post TI! Take care of yourself and stay positive. It's great that you are discovering your true calling and you're also setting a really great example by taking responsibility for your actions. We will miss you while you're gone! But you will be even BIGGER when you get back . Remember we got your back in the ATL! Peace!

[jwgmac]

As a person who was born and raised in rural Missouri I have no idea how it was growing up in your situation. I commend you for accepting your punishment and for not making excuses for your behavior. You are now setting a fine example for the people that love your music and follow your lead. BRAVO!! Good luck in your efforts to combat guns and violence and may your time in jail pass quickly. God Bless

[Ohioan730]

T.I. and other guys like him have always had it in them to change the world. They are directly affected by the ills that plague America, so they react to that. When the notion of hope and a new day arises, they are also affected by that. There is finally a light on the horizon.

T.I. is just one of millions who end up down the wrong path because they made choices based on an unfortunate frame of mind. The reason T.I. had that gun was because a few years prior to that, he was in Cincinnati doing a concert and a random vehicle full of guys rolled up next to his SUV and killed half his entourage for no reason whatsoever. After that, he vowed never to be caught off guard and unfortunately, he was busted for possession of firearms that he was forbidden to own because of his prior convictions. The prior convictions were solely his fault and he's being a man and taking his punishment rather than whine about the injustice of how he got arrested. I admire him for that.

You'll be alright, T.I. A year is short compared to the rest of your young life and the good you will do for those who look up to you.

[InfosolutionWiz]

WELL SAID, WELL SAID!

[sueno]

Thanks T.I..

[keyskween]

Thank you T.I. I saw your video "Dead and Gone" and it makes a powerful statement. I wish you the best and please keep speaking and writing your message.

[Chaimirija]

I don't even need to read the entire article. The real problem is those neighborhoods. It it pretty disgusting that this country even allows any part of our country to get to that point.

[Ohioan730]

That's true and I feel extremely hopeful that we are beginning to focus on the conditions and the environments and the big picture rather than blame the kids who are dying everyday. When I was growing up in the 80s/early 90s, nobody cared at all. Half the people I knew growing up I'll never see again because of death or some of them went to jail and died there or are still serving time from the 90s. They are simply...gone. I was a "good" kid who did what I was supposed to do and I was still at risk. I'm happy to have made it but I mourn the ones who didn't.

[theghostsong]

The ghettos were never meant to be anything more than concrete reservations. The results of bigots trying to use economic might when military power and Jim Crow failed.

[treboi]

TI needs to do a LOT more than write a couple of paragraphs, do court ordered community service and create an MTV reality show about going to jail...

Do I think he can do it...;yes, does the community need it...yes, will he truely make a change? We're waiting TI...

Good luck and when you get out I hope you're a shining beacon to the kids...

[zenwhenicanbe2]

If you put down your g*u*n but go back to "singing" about glorifying misogyny, money, crime, reckless behavior then I think the point is getting missed. There have been g*u*n*s in America for centuries with few public social consequences until the fabric of America began to unravel. I will grant you that the War on Drugs did most of the work for you... but the vast majority of hip hop music is not exactly helping as it's entire entertainment content is predicated on devaluing equality between people and substituting it with a sprint to the finish line of money, loose women and any other fleeting hedonistic urge.

[Chaimirija]

Tobacco industry...
Alcohol industry...
Finanacial industry..

[IGNSTHMD]

"These are people who lack education and skill, who have bad health, poor housing. Low levels of aspiration and high levels of mental distress…Each disability is the more intense because it exists within a web of disabilities. And if one problem is solved, and the others are left constant, there is little gain.”(Nagpaul). it is funny how your arguement falls back on itself. poor choices are the problem or more correctly a context of detriment created by a web of slanted choices. dissaffectedness is created in this case by the suggestion that an individuals path to upward mobility is a commodity of the state or not about personal ownership. pull the plug on the real gangster mentality not the people who have mastered the mentality. everywhere in the governement you see brazen lies, misplacement, and neglect; these things have consequences. ask yourself how legislation is created to deprive a specified group of people their ammended right to bear arms and how that kind of noxious outreach creates a simultainous malfeasence and preference that feed into materialism and horizontal violence amongst other things.

[londongal]

T.I. I wish you all the best with your crusade. Godspeed.

[rameyes]

there is a diffrence in you owning a gun and crying that others have one too,police carry guns and are known to make stupid mistakes,and home ownners and buiss. owners have them for protection...from what aliens from outer space.there are no wings and halos to seperate us , the gun is not the wepon it is the person behind it,and blaming music and the way people dress is toilet water stop crying.people only feel safe when they are blaming someone else,there are proffesionals women and men with pregnet kids,on drugs,creditcard debt,losing their home,school loans, both working and barley making it and not having kids only cause they cant afford it, its not cause their not ready its cause they owe everyone so how can they decide forthemselves,go ahead blame rappers music clothes,border problems,we went to the same schools and further so why do live and speak like drop out bums.

[Firenze]

Except that you and your loved ones are 40 times more likely to die a violent death if you have a gun in your home. Way to buy into the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" method of distraction.

[molonlabe]

40 x? Got a source for that?

[djkrlsn]

FIrenze--if you add back all the defensive uses that Kellerman admits he left out of that debunked study, it turns out that even in the dysfunctional group --it turns out that guns are used by the owners successgully about 500 to each failure instead of Kellerman's 40+ to 1 failures--find something new

[dpiyjrtmfr]

Guns don't kill people, people kill people. True, but people with guns have a distinct advantage when it comes to killing.

[Chaimirija]

hmmmm what about the men who have annilated their entire families lately...not blaming THE GUNS btw...seems to be a socio-economic reasons. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmm

[Gordo10]

word

[BlackYowe]

We have to stop celebrating ganster culture there is now doubt about it. That would do more than gun control. If people kept their kids from wearing the cloths and listening to the music it would do allot.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/05/11/2009-05-11_untitled__2bronx11m.html

[BlackYowe]

Good luck. I read a story tonight that broke my heart a Mother with tears running down her cheeks because her son was shot and killed in Buffalo on day after graduating from college.
http://www.buffalonews.com/cityregion/story/669843.html

This story sums up America's waste of lives, please read?

[djkrlsn]

Truly tragic, but BC/VPC gunbans would have done nothing--and I definitely agree that it is the gang problem much more than the guns that resulted in the death of this young man