"Unforgivable Youth" is a song by American rapper Lupe Fiasco featuring American musician and record producer Jason Evigan. It was released as the 15th and penultimate track from his fourth studio album, Food & Liquor II: The Great American Rap Album Pt. 1 (2012). The first two verses discuss America's history of settler colonialism and slavery. The third verse details archaeologists in the future, who ironically believe that it was an egalitarian, peaceful society because of its advanced technology, infrastructure, and emphasis on wealth.
"Unforgivable Youth" looks at how ignorance leads to adopting values that are believed to be for the greater good, when in fact being harmful. The first two verses touch upon colonialism, which includes the pilgrims, who are celebrated during Thanksgiving Day. Rather than being a day of celebration, it is a day of mourning for Native Americans. European settlers brought along the smallpox, which wiped out many native populations who did not have immunity to the diseases they carried. In addition, they stole land from and tried to convert Native Americans to Christianity. There is reference to the "500 year war," with the attempted genocide of Indigenous peoples, resulting in loss of family, land, and culture. Settlers believed this to be "good" for their country, in the name of expansionism.
Concerning slave labor, this refers to America exploiting minorities to do unpaid work for them, resulting in a racial hierarchy and discriminatory practices. Consider immigrants who enter the country with the idea of the "American dream" and work hard to provide for their families back home. Historically, an instance is shipping Africans across the Atlantic for slave trade. The phrase "manifest destiny" was used as justification for settlers to conquer more land, the perspective that it was virtuous and a mission sent from God. This resulted in the forced relocation and massacring of Native Americans. People who were non-white could not possess any land, which lent itself to a white supremacist doctrine. Fiasco continues to ask, "How can land be owned by another man?" where in Native American culture, the land is sacred and to be shared, where no one owns it. There was a language barrier between the Native Americans and settlers, where the latter party created treaties for dispossession of Native American land. This was seen as "fair" under America's terms, because it was legally obtained, despite use of manipulation.
The third verse takes a glimpse into the future, where archaeologists dug in the east. They assumed that America was "advanced," "organized," "well-behaved," and "civil" based on resources, dental, and constitutional values. This, of course, is posed as irony; the "sheer amount of paper" has contributed to deforestation and natural ecosystem degradation, governmental bodies were not very honest, and the White House was not a religious temple.
Critical reception[]
Shawn Setaro of Huffpost wrote, "ambitious tune melds past and future critiques of imperialism." He named the third verse to be the "most chilling," where "Lupe creatively gives the future scientists understandable misconceptions that serve as prompts for the listener to think about our society and how we stack up to our ideals."[1]Billboard remarked less favorably, "introduces a hero-making piano line carried by a marching drum and limp guitar."[2]The Harvard Crimson critiqued the chorus lyrics, where they are "unusually cringe-inducing this time around."[3]HipHopDX's Justin Hunte positively said, "represents like Lu's "Conflict Diamonds Remix": simultaneously intriguing and educational."[4]
[Chorus: Jason Evigan]
This world, my heart, my soul
Things that I don't know
The icicles they grow
They never let me go
Scars are left as proof
But tears they soak on through
Things I've done
My young
My unforgivable youth
[Verse 1: Lupe Fiasco]
With land on the horizon and passion in their eyes and
What they think are islands are much more in their size and
Bountiful and plentiful and resource to provide them
Supplies slim, morale once so heavily inside them
Now steadily declining
Return is not an option as necessity denies them
With this they choose to dive in
Now along the shore and so aware of their arriving
Are the children of this land prepared to share in their surviving
A pageantry of feathers stands his majesty with treasure
Not the material things of kings that could never last forever
But secrets of the spirit world and how to live in harmony together
Unbeknownst to him his head would be the first that they would sever
And stuck up on a pike up along the beach
Kept up as a warning to the rest to turn away from their beliefs
And so began it here, and for five hundred years
Torture, terror, fear 'til they nearly disappear
[Chorus: Jason Evigan]
This world, my heart, my soul
Things that I don't know
The icicles they grow
They never let me go
Scars are left as proof
But tears they soak on through
Things I've done
My young
My unforgivable youth
[Verse 2: Lupe Fiasco]
Ways and means from the trade of human beings
A slave labor force provides wealth to the machine
And helps the new regime establish and expand
Using manifest destiny to siphon off the land
From native caretakers who can barely understand
How can land be owned by another man?
Warns, "One can not steal what was given as a gift;
Is the sky owned by birds and the rivers owned by fish?"
But the lesson went unheeded, for the sake of what's not needed
You kill but do not eat it
The excessive and elitists don't repair it when they leave it
The forests's were cleared, the factories were built
And all mistakes will be repeated
By your future generations doomed to pay for your mistreatments
Foolishness and flaws, greed and needs and disagreement
And in your rush to have the most, from the day you left your boats
You'll starve but never die in a world of hungry ghosts
[Chorus: Jason Evigan]
This world, my heart, my soul
Things that I don't know
The icicles they grow
They never let me go
Scars are left as proof
But tears they soak on through
Things I've done
My young
My unforgivable youth
[Verse 3: Lupe Fiasco]
As archaeologists dig in the deserts of the east
A pit a hundred meters wide and a hundred meters deep
They discover ancient cars on even older streets
And a city well preserved and most likely at its peak
A culture so advanced, and by condition of the teeth
They can tell that they were civil, not barbaric in the least
A society at peace. With liberty and justice for all
Neatly carved in what seems to be a wall
They would doubt that there was any starvation at all
That they pretty much had the poverty problem all solved
From the sheer amount of paper, most likely used for trade
Everything's so organized. They had to be well behaved
Assumed they had clean energy, little to no enemies
Very honest leaders with overwhelming sympathies
Religions kinda complex. Kinda hard to figure out
But this must be the temple
This White House
[Chorus: Jason Evigan]
This world, my heart, my soul
Things that I don't know
The icicles they grow
They never let me go
Scars are left as proof
But tears they soak on through
Things I've done
My young
My unforgivable youth
