Philadelphia emcee Cassidy has recently responded to multiple figures disrespecting Eminem following Dr Umar Johnson’s appearance on the Joe Budden Show, during which he proclaimed that Eminem should never be declared the best rapper.
During an appearance on The Art Of Dialogue podcast, Cassidy (real name Barry Reese) responded to the pan-African, Black fundamentalist figure Dr Umar Johnson, who insisted that naming Eminem as the best rapper of all time is feeding into “white supremacy.”
When asked if he agreed with Dr Umar, Reese expressed that he profoundly disagreed with the idea that Eminem (real name Marshall Mathers) couldn’t be considered a great rapper.
Speaking to The Art of Dialogue, Cassidy stated, “I do think Eminem is great. He proved it a lot of times. A lot of classic projects, a lot of classic songs, a lot of classic freestyles.” He continued, “He’s been making history over and over again and been doing records with all type of races, all type of different backgrounds. It’s hard to say that he ain’t great.”
Reese admitted that he doesn’t think it’s helpful to racialise rap music and unveiled that hip-hop has always been a melting pot, disclosing, “I don’t want to make it based on race. It did start as Black culture; Black and Spanish people started Hip Hop. But I feel like Eminem been studying it since he was born! He knows a lot more about the culture than the average Black person, so I feel he deserves to get a pass.”
During his appearance on the Joe Budden Show Dr Umar Johnson stated, “This is going to my African fundamentalism. No non-African can ever be the best of anything African. It is an insult to the ancestors, it is an insult to the race, and it is an insult to every Black person!”
He concluded, “We gotta stop naming non-African people as being the best of any aspect of our cultural power because it is an insult … I can acknowledge Eminem’s talent. But for you to put him at the top, that’s white supremacy.”
Last year, Bronx emcee Melle Mel stated that the majority of lists ranked Eminem too high and insisted that nobody would think he was good if he was black, which caused a lot of controversy.
