You Must Learn

Yo, Chris, what you doin' out of school?

Yo, man, they just suspended me, boo

Weren't they suspending the teacher?

Yeah man, I'm gettin' so sick at this, man, they teachin' us about nothing, man

You know what the bottom line is for black people out here, it's quite simple

You must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

You, you must learn

It's calm yet wild the style that I speak

Just deal with facts and you will never get weak in the heart

In fact you'll start to illuminate, knowledge to others in a song

Let me demonstrate the force of knowledge

Knowledge reigned supreme

The ignorant is ripped to smithereens

What do you mean when you say I'm rebellious

'Cause I don't accept everything that you're telling us?

What are you selling us? The creator dwellin' us

I sit in your unknown class while you're failing us

I failed your class 'cause I ain't with your reasoning

You're tryin' make me you by seasoning

Up my mind with see Jane run, see John walk in a hardcore New York

Come on now, that's like a chocolate cow

It doesn't exist no way, no how

It seems to me that in a school that's ebony

African history should be pumped up steadily, but it's not

And this has got to stop, see Spot run, run, get Spot

Insulting to a Black mentality, a Black way of life

Or a jet Black family, so I include with one concern, that

You must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

I believe that if you're teaching history

Filled with straight up facts, no mystery

Teach the student what needs to be taught

'Cause Black and White kids both take shorts

When one doesn't know about the other one's culture

Ignorance swoops down like a vulture

'Cause you don't know that you ain't just a janitor

No one told you about Benjamin Banneker

A brilliant Black man that invented the almanac

Can't you see where KRS is coming at?

With Eli Whitney, Haile Selassie

Granville Woods made the walkie-talkie

Lewis Latimer improved on Edison

Charles Drew did a lot for medicine

Garrett Morgan made the traffic lights

Harriet Tubman freed the slaves at night

Madam C.J. Walker made the straightening comb

But you won't know this if you weren't shown

The point I'm gettin' at, it might be harsh

Is we're just walkin' around brainwashed

See, what I'm sayin' is not to diss a man

We need the '89 school system

One that caters to a Black return because

You must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn

Just like I told you, you, you must learn