Noname refuses to apologize for including Jay Electronica's verse on album amid antisemitic claims
Acclaimed rapper Noname is refusing to apologize for including a verse from fellow emcee Jay Electronica that has been criticized for being antisemitic on her latest album, Sundial.
The verse appears on the song "Balloons," which Noname announced would be the album's lead single in July. That decision prompted some fans to question the inclusion of Electronica, who has been linked to antisemitic rhetoric in the past.
Scott Dudelson/Getty; Johnny Nunez/WireImage Noname and Jay Electronica
"Here's the truth. No, I am not antisemitic," Noname wrote in an Instagram Story on Sunday. "I don't hate groups of people. I am against white supremacy, which is a global system that privileges people who identify as white. I've been clear about this for years."
Ignoring or ignorant to the fact that white supremacists are rampantly antisemitic and thus being anti-white supremacy would thus mean also being anti-antisemitism, Noname continued, "I'm not going to apologize for a verse I didn't write. I'm not going to apologize for including it on my album. If you feel like I'm wrong for including that's fair. Don't listen. Unfollow and support all the other amazing rappers putting out dope music. Your disappointment truly means absolutely nothing to me, and I say that with love."
Noname had previously defended the inclusion of Jay Electronica, who has links to Louis Farrakhan as a member of the Nation of Islam, designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center due in part to its "notorious antisemitism and homophobia."
The Chicago rapper threatened to cancel her album's release amid the Jay Electronica backlash before deleting her Twitter account altogether.
Electronica — who dated Erykah Badu for five years and shares a daughter, Mars, with her — sampled Farrakhan on the intro to his 2021 album A Written Testimony, which also includes the track "The Ghost of Soulja Slim," in which Electronica makes an antisemitic reference.
On "Balloons," Electronica trafficks in conspiracy theories while making several obliquely antisemitic allusions, to the Rothschilds, to Farrakhan, to the Ukrainian president, ending his bars with, "If anybody asks, tell 'em Farrakhan sent me / It's the War of Armageddon and I'm beggin' the listener / If you ain't fightin', that mean you either dead or a prisoner."
In February, Farrakhan delivered a speech rife with antisemitic and homophobic bigotry entitled, "The War of Armageddon has begun," referencing the Biblical battle of the End Times.
Reps for Noname and Jay Electronica did not immediately respond to EW's request for comment.
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