I wanted to make a film, I made it
I didn't wait for Canal+
I didn't wait for the CNC
I was tired of seeing the same ones
So I wrote my own script
I didn't sit back with my arms crossed
I only relied on my talent
Only my determination has clout
I had to do twice as much
As those with half my talent
In France that's normal for an African
You ask me who's to blame
I didn't come into the world
To build someone else’s dreams
I carry my wins and my losses
I don't serve the French state
Yet the French state keeps f*cking you over
And if you get out of it, it's just crumbs
To make you believe that if you failed
Because the stone the builder rejects
Will end up in the window
One single film by Kery James
Two hundred by sh*tty hipsters
You made it on your own
You see what I mean, alone
Poverty, how many live below the line
Since the state's bright idea
To profit off immigrants
Palming off the projects on them
Where the middle class was killing itself
But compare those blocks
To what our parents fled from
That's luxury for someone from Haiti
When I look at those who have more
I remember those who have less
As far back as I can recall
I never saw Mom complain
Do you know where we come from
Yeah, I made it alone
You got it, alone
Yeah, poverty below the threshold
The suburbs aren't the only ones
Country folks, neglect, misery’s rural too
I know little white kids
For whom life is brutal
Whites suffer too
Thanks, I wasn’t watching the news
The hood’s worn a yellow vest for twenty years
Nobody gives a f*ck
France is in denial
A mix of ignorance and contempt
Don't talk to me about ethnicity
I’ve got uncles who think Africa’s a country
Seen by those who never set foot there
Who talk about them at every meal
Won't even think of checking the facts
Don't hang with those people, you’ll get jumped
Myths and legends on TV
Gotta integrate without mixing
Struggle with no counter-example
The future will be your present
No colony without consequences
Anti-white racism, so much complacency
Believe me, I know this France
I'm not saying everybody's bad
I'm saying fear and neglect
Turn a population vicious
There's racism in France, tell me about it
I wrote Letter to the Republic
We don't move things forward
By just stating the facts
Take it or act, I'll be straight with you
Life's a matter of choices
Neither left nor right
But if our brothers can't find work
What can they do
Except build their own company
You look at the world cross-eyed
You still believe in SOS Racisme and protests
I'm not naive, I'm betrayed
I don't believe what they taught me anymore
Equality, the homeland, sure
Are you the one who chooses
Start a business, who cashes in on your credit
Get in the system or perish
Forget your dreams in a town-hall lobby
As long as they talk about an elite
They say you can make it if you deserve it
But you deserve to make it
The state wants to lull you
And play slumlord
Just one model of success
Theirs, built on money
It's to turn them into old folks like them
You can hit the jackpot
You won't beat the casino at its own game
Pyramid system, money rises
The sh*t stays at the bottom
I'm not saying everyone's in on the plot
I'm saying it doesn't bother them
I have brothers who are gone
I don't see the hood through rosy glasses
'Cause I grew up among nettles
I saw guys full of vice
Smoke a dude whom their mother
Still saw as her own son
Bullet in the head, violent death
Is it the state that pulls the trigger
Like in the northern neighborhoods
You end up getting used to it
We never needed the state
To fill our graveyards
Police blunders, no safety net
ID checks at an age when you don't know who you are
Ending up glorifying not-so-glorious stuff
More obstacles, they're more dangerous
They put your life at stake
Dealing dope to sons of
Locked up so they can party at night
You're just a pawn in their little game
Politicians, only glory drives them
How could you think otherwise
When presidents are with show-biz chicks
How many millionaire kids from the hood
Have erased the word solidarity
We've made dough, yeah
How many, how many entrepreneurs
How many stars has the hood produced
But success makes them amnesic
What they think they own, paralyzed
How many dare step up
How many dare face them
When they trash us in their papers
I'm not trying to deny the problems
I don't count on the state
That question belongs to the past
I have only one question