Is weezy better high or sober?

I know it sounds like I shouldn’t ask this, but I think it really is a valid question.  I mean, let’s look at some of the video clips... we can see how funny Lil’ Wayne was when he first finds out that “Tha Carter III” sold 1,000,000 records, just babbling on about book drives…and his raps are hilarious, sometimes they don’t even rhyme, and its not like he’s drinking… you know?  Let’s look at his argument in the song “Me and my drink”.  He writes:

hey...do you know that i need ya
Cuz baby right now
It feels like the whole world is against me
Ever since the death of pimp c
But me im up in the studio me and my drank
Me and my drank me and my drank…..
My girl trippin and damn i gotta hear my momma mouth
My home bois say i should slow down a little
But this shit that im on make me slow down a lot

His whole persona is based on being this slow, high guys, and now he is just so present, and his raps are so formulated, he’s been writing them down (!) and its just boring.  He isn’t the same guy he was before.  I am glad that he stopped doing drugs if that’s what he needs, but like his says in a Tim Westwood interview:

“I’ve kind of put the cup down for a minute.  Ain’t nothing in the cup right now….but honestly its nobody’s goddamn business what’s in my cup, what’s in your cup, what’s in their cup.  Its your cup.  Drink it.  Die.  Kill yourself if that’s what you want to do.  Who knows?  Who knows what’s in the cup?  It could be prune juice.  Who knows?.... Its not a beautiful thing ‘cuz no one knows what’s in the cup.  Unless you come up and take a sip from my cup how can you say it’s a beautiful thing?  Also, when people drink alcohol, they react like they’ve been drinking acohol.  So whatever was in my cup, the only reaction I had was get more popular, did a lot more things that I ever did, picked up a guitar, learned how to play a guitar, started using autotune, stretched my voice, and become number one in the country with everything I’ve dropped.  Maybe I should pick the cup back up.”

This quote is very telling.  He did have a lot of success when we was drinking syrup, so why stop?  He talks now about how happy he is to be sober, but he was right.  The fans liked him more when he was high.

Is Lil' Wayne a Good Role Model?

In an interview with Katie Couric, she asks him if he thinks he is a good role model for his fans and he replies,

“’I’m not an example for how people should live their lives.  Never in my life would I ever set out to be an example for people on how to live their lives. If you need an example for how to live, then you just shouldn’t have been born. Straight up. I am a great role model, because I’m only a role model for two, and that’s all. That’s what matters to me - those two. So why don’t you worry about yours, and let them worry about theirs? I got mine.”

This is kind of a vague response.  He says that he only needs to be a role model for his children, but as such a public figure, do we agree with him?  Doesn’t he have a responsibility to his young fans as well?!  For this reason, I have decided to try and answer Katie Couric’s question more thoughtfully.

1.     Yes, he is a good role model

On one hand, Lil’ Wayne is definitely a good role model.  He was an excellent student in school, worked very hard as a young man towards his dreams, found success, and has been able to care for his family.  He believed in himself when no one else did.  He is extremely creative and innovative.  He doesn’t even write his raps down, he just makes them up in his head and then raps them into the microphone.  According to interviews, sometimes he stays up all night recording.  He has developed his own record label, Young Money, and through this record label has been able to help 10 young people become more successful in the music world.  He also took University of Houston and then University of Phoenix online, earning his Bachelor’s Degree.  He is  very public now about how great he feels being sober, and how great it is that his sweat doesn’t smell like marijuana anymore.  He teaches kids everyday that it isn’t cool to do drugs.  He also created a non-profit after Hurricane Katrina to help rebuild his neighborhood.  And he goes into schools to talk to the kids!

2.     No, he is not a good role model

How can Lil’ Wayne be a good role model?  His lyrics are all about having sex and doing drugs.  He even dedicated a song to cough syrup as his lover.  He went to jail for gun possession!  He is also reportedly a member of the Crips! He misses concerts because he is too high!  He had three children by three different mothers in one year.  And he lost his virginity at 11! How can Lil’ Wayne be considered a good role model when he isn’t even caring for the mothers of his children?  He may be off drugs for now, but obviously all of this information is just coming together to show that Wayne has an addictive personality in everything that he does.  Look how many tattoos he has, how many women he sleeps with, how many drugs he does.  The only creative way he uses this addictive personality is by staying up all night rapping, recording a verse on every song he can get his hands on.  But let’s look at the quality of the songs.  Is it good?

3.     Final Decision

I think these girls say it all.  Lil’ Wayne, you are a loser!  I wouldn’t want my kids to listen to you!

8 things we can learn from lil wayne’s tattoos

so, we all know lil’ wayne has a lot of tats.. it seems like he’s getting a new one everyday.. Tattoos are so personal; they are forever.  So what do Wayne’s tats say about him?  What can we learn about weezy’s life from his tats?

1.     92782 tattoo on his arm: The bold numbers on his arm represent the date September 27, 1982, the day Weezy was born.

2.     Martian Tattoo on his arm, “Misunderstood” tattoo on his face: Lil Wayne says in his song “3peat,” “I am not the same I am a martian”.  His newest song is called, “I Am Not a Human Being.”  He has a song on “Tha Carter III” in which he samples the Animals song “Misunderstood” with the lyrics, “But I'm just a soul whose intentions are good.  Oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood”

Obviously, Lil’ Wayne feels a little bit out of place, and he chooses to show this on his face, which is very public.  When he talks about being an alien, a lot of people think that he is just trying to seem weirder to get more fans, but I think that he always felt a little bit left out of the rap world because he was rapping for so long before he got any real attention.  I also think he might feel like an alien because his drug use makes him so unable to relate to other people. 

3.    “Rabbit” on his arm, “BM JR” tat on his chest, “C” between his eyes: Here, we see Lil’ Wayne’s 3 big heroes: his step-father Reginald “Rabbit”, his mentor Birdman, and his mother Cita. 

Wayne’s step-father is the man who first got Wayne into drug dealing as a young man.  He was the only successful role model Wayne had in his life until he met Birdman, who signed him to Cash Money records. When Rabbit died, Wayne says he had to become a man and take care of his mother.  “BM JR” stands for Birdman Junior.  This shows Lil’ Wayne’s feelings toward Birdman, a New Orleans rapper who took Wayne under his arm when he was 11 years old.  Though it has been suspected that they are in a sexual relationship based on pictures of them kissing on the lips, they say they are like father and son.  The “C” between Wayne’s eyes reportedly stands for Cita, the name of his mother.  In the song “Misunderstood,” Wayne raps, “you can see the Cita, see the Cita in my features.”  With a big C in between his eyes, it would be hard not to!

4.     4 tear tattoos on his face:  Possibly wayne’s most controversial tattoo, he says that they represent four people in his family who have died.  They’re controversial because a tear drop on the face usually represents someone you’ve killed.. but Wayne has avoided this fact.  So this one may remain somewhat a mystery.  He recently covered three of them with a “tribal symbol” though.  His explanation was that his mother Cita had told him she was sick of seeing so many tears on his face and wasn’t one enough?  So to honor her opinion, he covered the others.  This doesn’t actually clear up if Wayne killed anybody or not though, because his mom could have been upset to see any representation of suffering on her son’s face.

5.     Number 17 on his stomach: This one’s pretty easy, it represents the 17^th ward of New Orleans, where Wayne grew up. The fleur-de-lis on his face also represents his hometown.

6.    Cross tattoo on his arm, prayer tattoo on his back, “Fear God” Tattoo on his eyelids: This tattoos show that Lil’ Wayne is a religious man, which has been confirmed by him several times although he rarely raps about his faith.  The daily prayer on his back reads:

Give me the patience that I need

To keep my piece of mind,

And with life's cares, I hope, Dear God,

Some happiness to find.

Give me the courage to face life`s trials

and not from troubles run.

let me keep this thought in mind.

"Thy Will," not "Mine," be done.

7.     Pistol tattoo on his neck, “A Gun” tattoo on his hand: Lil’ Wayne feels a connection to guns.  It is unclear whether these two references refer to his arrest and subsequent jail time in 2007 for illegal gun possession, him shooting himself with his mom’s gun when he was a kid, a mix of both of these traumatizing experiences, or something about guns we don’t even know about!  Interesting that the hand tattoo shows him with “a gun” in his hand! (his other hand says “the world” meaning he has a gun in one hand and the world in the other!)

8. Cash Money Tattoo on his stomach: This is Lil' Wayne's first tattoo, and shows how important his Cash Money Records affiliation is, mostly because of how important his relationship with Birdman is.  He started out with Cash Money when he was 11, and the tattoo is a way to show that he will never leave.  It is also reminiscent in its placement to Tupac's "Thug Life" tattoo. 

Any other important tattoos you all can think of?  Some of his are just stupid, like the Rolls Royce and ESPN tattoos on his arm…they seem totally pointless!