Key Takeaways
- Charlamagne Tha God called the debate over Fat Joe’s N-word use unproductive, saying, "I don’t know if Fat Joe is Black, but he’s definitely a n***a."
- The Breakfast Club host said white supremacists likely find it funny to watch Black and brown people argue over who can use the word, while admitting he wishes he could stop saying it himself.
- Marc Lamont Hill maintained that Fat Joe is not Black despite his ties to hip-hop, while Joe responded that his father is Afro-Cuban.
Charlamagne Tha God thinks the debate about Fat Joe using the N-word has been blown way out of proportion.
On a recent episode of The Joe Budden Podcast, Joey Crack animatedly called himself "the Blackest n***a you ever seen in your life," after outlining his relationship to the origins of hip-hop in the Bronx. JBP co-host Marc Lamont Hill wasn’t present for the episode's taping but later shared that he disapproved of Joe using the N-word.
On a recent episode of The Breakfast Club, Charlamagne described the N-word debate as unproductive. "I don’t know if Fat Joe is Black, but he's definitely a n***a,” he said in a clip you can see below.
"I don’t wanna say the N-word. I wish I could stop saying it. I know better and don't do better," Charlamagne continued. "And I know there is nothing funnier to white supremacists than to see a bunch of Black and brown people arguing about who can use the word n***a."
The following day, Charlamagne gave Donkey of the Day to those who continue having "unserious arguments" about the N-word. "I only use the term N-word when I’m talking about low vibrational people," he said.
On Hill's YouTube channel, he proclaimed that while he doesn’t consider Fat Joe to be racist, he also doesn’t think the rapper is Black.
"I am not trying to police anybody's ethnicity. I am not trying to police anybody's racial identity," Hill said. "But what I will say is: Fat Joe seems to be using Black here, ironically, or he's using it metaphorically. … We know his ethnic roots. And we know that there's no reason to believe, based on that, that he is Black."
Fat Joe later responded on Instagram, commenting that his father is Afro Cuban.
