What It Means - Drive-By Truckers

He was running down the street

When they shot him in his tracks

About the only thing agreed upon

Is he ain’t coming back

There won’t be any trial

So the air it won’t be cleared

There’s just two sides calling names

Out of anger out of fear

If you say it wasn’t racial

When they shot him in his tracks

Well I guess that means that you ain’t black

It means that you ain’t black

I mean Barack Obama won

And you can choose where to eat

But you don’t see too many white kids lying

Bleeding on the street

In some town in Missouri

But it could be anywhere

It could be right here on Ruth Street

In fact it’s happened here

And it happened where you’re sitting

Wherever that might be

And it happened last weekend

And it will happen again next week

And when they turned him over

They were surprised there was no gun

I mean he must have done something

Or else why would he have run

And they’ll spin it for the anchors

On the television screen

So we can shrug and let it happen

Without asking what it means

What it means?

What it means?

Then I guess there was protesting

And some looting in some stores

And someone was reminded that

They ain’t called colored folks no more

I mean we try to be politically

Correct when we call names

But what’s the point of post-racial

When old prejudice remains?

And that guy who killed that kid

Down in Florida standing ground

Is free to beat up on his girlfriend

And wave his brand new gun around

While some kid is dead and buried

And laying in the ground

With a pocket full of Skittles

What it means?

What it means?

Astrophysics at our fingertips

And we’re standing at the summit

And some man with a joystick

Lands a rocket on a comet

We’re living in an age

Where limitations are forgotten

The outer edges move and dazzle us

But the core is something rotten

And we’re standing on the precipice

Of prejudice and fear

We trust science just as long

As it tells us what we want to hear

We want our truths all fair and balanced

As long as our notions lie within it

There’s no sunlight in our asses

And our heads are stuck up in it

And our heroes may be rapists

Who watch us while we dream

But don’t look to me for answers

'Cause I don’t know what it means

What it means?

What it means???