T-Pain says that the legendary rapper 2Pac wouldn’t be as revered had he come along in an era of social media and would’ve gotten “ate the fuck up lyrically.” Pain shared the hot take during a recent discussion on DJ Akademiks’ Twitch channel.
“‘Pac would’ve gotten killed sooner [if social media existed] and he would’ve gotten his ass ate the fuck up lyrically,” T-Pain said, to Akademiks’ surprise.
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“Lyricism-wise, ‘Pac would’ve got ridiculously murdered. Bro, ‘Pac was a crazy lyricist in our time because ain’t nobody else have no platform,” he went on. “If the platforms would’ve been what they are now, ‘Pac would’ve been ate the fuck up […] I’m just saying what we look at as ‘Pac’s greatest lyrics right is peanuts to what we hear today.”
When pushed back on by Akademiks, Pain agreed that he considers Pac to be a poet and one of the greatest of all time, but reaffirmed that if social media was around at the time, things would be different.
“‘Pac is a full fucking poet,” he said. “Pac was — if not the — one of the greatest lyricist at the time, but if we would’ve had social media back then and everybody would’ve been able to have their opinion, there would’ve been way the fuck more disrespectful n****s at the time. They would’ve been dying to be more disrespectful to ‘Pac.”
He also discussed how Pac’s career would’ve continued had he not been killed in the tragic 1996 shooting: “If ‘Pac was alive right now, they would’ve discredited everything he said just because he was old. That’s it. He would’ve been saying the same thing as the young n****s, but it would’ve been less credit ’cause he’s old.”
The opinion quickly garnered backlash on social media, with fans in the comments section of a repost shared by The Art of Dialogue calling out Pain.
Check out Pain’s sit-down with Akademiks below.