CHARLIE ROSE: How else are you different?
NAS: Well, I’ve always been a calm individual, but I’m a lot more calm, and I’ve changed in ways where I was once a rebel to America, and now I like America a lot more. I love America!
ROSE: Why do you like America a lot more? Because it accepted you?
NAS: No! I don’t want to feel accepted.
ROSE: You don’t?
NAS: I want to, I want to earn it. I want to, I want to, I’m like everybody else in this world and I just want to be a part of this whole human family and I don’t need to be accepted by anybody. But it’s better for me because now I can see different. I can see why certain things are the way they are, why the system works a certain way, and it doesn’t seem like a beast that I can’t conquer anymore. It feels like this is my soil, this is where I’m from, this is who I am. A proud American. There was a time when I didn’t feel that way.
-Rapper Nas on the May 30, 2014 edition of PBS's Charlie Rose show.
Crossposted at Newsbusters.