Background 
  info: After telling a newsgroup of hundreds of visitors that he was leaving 
  the actual group and hip-hop all together, Mike Burke returns to say that everything 
  he said was a hoax. He also explains his reasoning behind his "experiment" and addresses a few people's comments.


 

>Assuming 
  the original post was a hoax, ya'll got to keep in mind that it spawned more 
  thought and dicussion about hip hop's place in our lives and in american/world 
  culture (on a real down to earth level that even the most simple and youngest 
  minds could follow) than ANY other post in years on this NG. If it was a hoax, 
  it was one of the most intriguing internet experiments I've seen to date.


Thank 
  you, quiz. Yes, I did fake my leaving hip-hop, but *this* was my intent. It 
  wasn't done as a joke or anything, it was done in a sincere attempt to spark 
  debate, learn something, and have everyone else learn something, too. These 
  last two weeks have been the most interesting timeI've ever spent on RMHH. The 
  debates in here have been incredible, especially Kari vs DLS and Akiem vs Flash. 
  If you've been following the the thread I started and/or "Catalyst - M. 
  Burke Response," you can't even front like you didn't learn anything. Now 
  I've had my little plan revealed before I could complete it, and now everyone 
  thinks I did this as some big joke just to fuck with people, thanks to a couple 
  of people who didn't even hear it from me. I put myself on the line, wrote that 
  long-ass post (y'all *know* how I hate to do that), got called "coward," 
  had a bunch of people on the, "Fuck Mike Burke, I'm down, he's just a wack-ass 
  mark" tip, had to write several more long-ass messages via e-mail, not 
  only to back up my story but to provoke more thought on anindividual basis, 
  couldn't even participate even though I had loads to say, but I still think 
  it was worth it. Now I'm going to have people who feel decieved and are going 
  to hate me, and even if my "net rep" is completely sullied, I'll still 
  be glad I did it. I've come away with a *much* better understanding of hip-hop, 
  and I'm sure a lot of you did, too. I've heard from several people in e-mail 
  who have told me how they've been doing a lot of thinking about their place 
  in hip-hop, and to have provoked people to do that is just as valuable to me 
  as what I learned personally, so even if all of RMHH wants to become my enemy, 
  at least they'll be an enemy with a more in-depth understanding of hip-hop.


>Yeah, 
  I just found out myself, and I'm fucking pissed. I, as well as many of you, 
  both posted and emailed very thoughtful, emotion-filled letters as to why Mike 
  Burke shouldnt leave hiphop. I feel like such a dick, because I really felt 
  bad that someone 3000 miles away felt they no longer belonged. I feel so fucking 
  deceived!! All that shit for nothing. Think about it. That fucking"Goodbye 
  RMHH" post is STILL running in here, and the whole thing was a hoax to 
  begin with.


You 
  see, this why I had to fake my leaving. If I had just posted a hypothetical 
  question, such as, "Say a white kid who really loves hip-hop comes to the 
  conclusion that he really isn't hip-hop and decides to leave it, what do you 
  guys think of that?", do you really think it would have gotten *nearly* 
  the repsonse, both in number of responses and intensity? The way I did it, people 
  actually felt emotion, it brought out their strongest convictions, and they 
  argued passionately. By doing it like this I was able to attack the whites (and 
  other "non-traditional heads") in hip-hop debate from a whole new 
  angle, and at a much more intense level. I have a pretty unique position here 
  in arguably the best place in the world to debate hip-hop issues in that I've 
  been here so long, contributed so much, and had a gimmick (my sense of humor) 
  that would be missed, so some people would try and get me to stay. If I wasn't 
  funny, most people probably wouldn't care, but I'm taking a few of their laughs 
  with me if I leave, and like Michael Jordan retiring, even if they don't give 
  a shit about the person, they'll miss the entertainment he gave them. So that 
  aspect got more people to respond. If a first-time poster wrote that he was 
  going to give up hip-hop, the debates would have been miniscule, maybe one or 
  two responses. But I have name-recognition and people know me and know what 
  I'm about, so it was able to bring out more effort and thought from people. 
  Once I had the idea, I *had* to do it, because no one else really could, and 
  if they could, they probably wouldn't have the idea. I couldn't let this go 
  to waste.


> 
  You know, the other day, when I was standing in the Park watching everyone perform 
  at the rocksteady crew anniversary thing, I thought of Mike Burke. All that 
  harmony between black, white, hispanic, asian, etc.... Made me think of how 
  wrong Mike Burke was, and what a HUGE mistake we made. When I was walking out 
  of the park, I saw necro giving a kid an interview. I actually walked over to 
  Necro just to ask him what his opinion was on the whole situation. I was going 
  to ask him what he thought of whites in hiphop, and where they stand. Not only 
  Necro, but I was seriously thinking of getting in touch with RA theRugged Man, 
  and asking him what he thought the proper role was for white people in hiphop, 
  and whether they belonged or not. BOY am I glad I didnt do that.


Don't 
  you see? This is exactly the type of thing I was hoping for. It wasn't meant 
  to be a prank on you, Maseo, it was supposed to be a learning experience for 
  everybody. You *should* have asked them, I would be fascinated to hear what 
  they have to say. Hip-hop is so damnably impossible to define, the more different 
  view points, the better, in order to find the truths from each argument and 
  combine them to find the real truth of what hip-hop *really* is. Getting the 
  opinions of those two would have been extremely valuable.


>Sure, 
  its still a relevant question, but the fact that I was played for a fool, and 
  poured out so much emotion into those writings for this guy, combined with the 
  fact that he KNEW he was bullshitting all the time, really Fucks me up! I'm 
  pissed, and I'm gonna stay pissed. This NG has gone way off the deep end. When 
  emotions can be conveyed and people can be made fools of by others in a NG, 
  there is Seriously something wrong. Deception???? Is that what this is all about?? 
  In the past year that I've been posting, I've stayed NOTHING BUT real with you 
  people. Everything I have ever said has been nothing but the gods honest truth. 
  Its a shame others cant be the same way. They build our trust, knowing they 
  will utilize that trust to perform an *experiment* on all of us guinea pigs. 
  Fuck that. Fuck them. I got other plans. Fuck You.


I'm 
  so sorry you feel that way, Maseo, and if your feelings don't change after you 
  hear it from me, I at least hope other people don't see it this way. It's not 
  like I knew I was going to do this all the time I've been here and this was 
  my plan from the start, the thought only occured to melike a month ago, and 
  I procastinated doing it until two and a half weeks ago. Yes, it was an experiment 
  on everybody, but the results were all laid out right in front of everybody, 
  so it's not like I was hoarding all of this to myself. It was to everyone's 
  benefit.


Via 
  e-mail I had to keep the secret, and even back it up, which was very difficult, 
  especially to make it convincing, and it didn't help that people were probing 
  me to see if I was really telling the truth. So many times I was tempted to 
  "just let this one person in on it," but I knew I couldn't, because 
  then I would lose the realness. So instead, I challenged people,especially the 
  whites who e-mailed me. I took the Kari/Akiem standpoint (although they aren't 
  totally similar, they are still the opposite of the accepted belief system around 
  here) in my e-mail arguments, and not only was I able to make the recipient 
  think (if he/she chose to truly think about what I said and was willing to honestly 
  evaluate his/her place in hip-hop), but by putting the the other perspectives 
  arguments in my own words and making my own arguments from their stand point, 
  I was able to put myself in their shoes and at least partially see from their 
  perspective. I learned a lot from it. That was one thing I got out of this that 
  the ng as a wholedidn't, but there's nothing I could do about that.


It 
  was interesting watching most of the whites in here speedily distancing themselves 
  from me to show how "down" they were, and how they weren't like that 
  "Mike Burke punk." But there were a few who took what I said to heart, 
  and really thought about it. Mike Dodd and WUZ! in particular had a lot of interesting 
  things to say, which I would have liked to comment on in here, but my computer 
  TOTALLY crashed Sunday, and I lost every single file I had. NyceStylez also 
  put in a LOT of thought, which was very encouraging to me. Hopefully many of 
  the lurkers did, too, because even if they didn't say anything about it here, 
  if they thought deeply about it, it was just as worthwhile. I had a lot more 
  stuff I wanted to say in this post, but since my computer crashed, I lost all 
  of my back e-mail and all of the posts I had saved to comment on. I just want 
  to take the time to thank everybody who responded, everyone who put themselves 
  through the rigors of honestself-introspection, and especially those who took 
  the time to be the main participants in the debates. Special thanks to Kari 
  for starting the"Catalyst - M. Burke Response" thread. And to rch33@janto.com 
  and the other person who impersonated me, get the bozack.


I hope 
  I've explained myself well enough, but if not, there's nothing I can do. I leave 
  it to y'all.


Peace?


"As 
  hard as it is to be perfect, I try" T-Mo


Mike 
  Burke.