 |
| A.I. generated image of Fat Joe as "Crack-Kim Great God Allah" |
On a recent episode of the
Joe and Jada Podcast, Rapper Fat Joe made this bombshell claim, "
I come from a projects called Godsville. Right? So also, it was like the Mecca of the Five Percenters. I was the God Crack-Kim Great God Allah. I’m telling you what it is, right. You gotta think…" The reactions from members of the Five Percent ran the spectrum from doubled-over laughter to outright anger. While no one has confirmed the validity of that story, I can see the possibility for a variety of reasons. It's possible that some Five Percenters said it as a joke to play upon the cultural identity politics in that neighborhood. There is some unfortunate history of Boriquas and other Spanish-speaking people being "othered" within the Hip Hop community and among Five Percenters, even to this day. Fat Joe has often talked about being "the fat little Puerto Rican kid" growing up around mostly Black people. It is hard for me to imagine Five Percenters seriously calling Fat Joe by the "righteous name" of Crack-Kim Great God Allah. Because the names that we choose are supposed to be righteous. From my experience, even the most street Five Percenters still hold this culture with some level of sacredness. Also, righteous names don't exist in a vacuum. With a name comes a cultural identity, familial relationships, and active Five Percenter community engagement. Within our culture we are expected to expound upon our chosen righteous name when among other Five Percenters. If our name is Power, we are expected to show and prove the reasoning for choosing that name and what it means, sometimes in an open public forum among a body of Five Percenters. None of these Five Percenter cultural elements or social norms were mentioned by Fat Joe. This leads me to think that it's not as real or serious as he suggests. Now if he goes back on the Pod naming his enlightener, talking about parliaments/rallies that he attended, what degrees that he knows, who he taught, etc., then I think we could take his conversation more seriously. What I do think is serious, and deserves discussion, is the fact that people even associate Five Percenters with criminal behavior.
Since our 1960's inception within the streets of New York, Five Percenters have been labeled as a gang and classified as a STG (Security Threat Group) due to incidents of violence and gang-related activity within some correctional facilities across the United States. While there did exist and does exist those who commit crimes and simultaneously claim to be Five Percenters, that is not our cultural way. The labels of being a gang or STG has always been a point of contention by those of us who are upstanding citizens within our communities, the same way that upstanding Muslims, Christians and Jews do not condone terrorism by those who profess to be members of their group. As a globally recognized face of the Five Percenters, I have worked extremely hard to challenge those mischaracterizations by being a positive productive example. Yet in too many cases to mention, there are alleged Five Percenters who continually add credence to these negative claims by not living up to our cultural values of being civilized and teaching civilization. One such example is our recent expulsion from the second primary school within our community that allowed us to utilize their space to hold our monthly Universal Parliaments and events.
In an April 24th, 2024 article Anchor Institutions and the Fate of Allah School in Mecca I wrote, "While there are brothers who consistently show up in
person/virtually once a week to talk for hours about our culture, there are no
professional revenue-generating workshops, classes, or projects being
facilitated at Allah School every day. We have no grant-funded youth
advocacy/community outreach programs being offered in the neighborhood. We
have no collaborative initiatives with area organizations and institutions that
are available on-site or virtually. Nothing is being offered by/for women and
girls; even though women represent 75% of the professional non-profit workforce
in the U.S. and the Allah School is a non-profit. Additionally, according to a
recent April 23rd Five Percenter Newspaper Facebook Group Post and my follow-up
confirmation with School Officials, we are now in jeopardy of losing P.S.
92 Mary McLeod Bethune as the current location of our Universal
Parliaments and the upcoming Show & Prove. A petition is being circulated
by the surrounding school community to stop us from utilizing the space due to
adult Five Percenters loitering, urinating, drinking alcohol, smoking
marijuana, and being noisy on school property." As of June 2025, and confirmed by school officials, we are now banned from utilizing P.S. 92 Mary McLeod Bethune due to alleged Five Percenters loitering and the use of illegal substances near school grounds. The first school in our community that we were banned from prior to this incident is P.S. 154 Harriet Tubman.
During the summer months our monthly Universal Parliaments and events are generally held outdoors in Medina (Brooklyn). As we move into the colder months, we will need to find new indoor accommodations to gather. Equally important is putting an effective policy and procedure in place that can stop us from continually losing access to community spaces and sabotaging our relationships with important community partners. That only gives credence to the negative lawless claims that people have about us. While this is definitely unfortunate, it is also an opportunity for us to do better and live up to our cultural values of being civilized and teaching civilization.
 |
"We don't talk about nobody. Because religious people fight against one another. You can’t tell me they don’t because they do." -Allah, The Father (November 15, 1967 Interview) |
When I began this website twenty years ago, my mission has been to inspire, empower, and educate my readership through my documented work about various sciences of life from "a" Five Percenter perspective, not a perspective of "THE" Five Percenter. Because of my growing digital footprint, global visibility and international work, I was thrust into a domain where I am now viewed as one of the most recognizable figures and foremost authorities on the Five Percent Nation. This has never been something that I have aspired to, yet I have learned to accept being this public figure. It took me a long time to even fully embrace social media because I was averse to the concept of 'having followers'. This so-called "celebrity" as folks call it, has also taken time getting used to. When random people recognize and stop me in airports or different cities to share how my work has positively impacted their lives, I am still caught off guard and reminded of what this really means. To me, I am simply doing my part to add more beauty to this world to help repair what I see is broken. Nothing more and nothing less. What I have struggled with getting used to are the trolls that any celebrity deals with. It's hard to understand the constant fixation people can have on someone else. It's hard to even imagine how disruptive that would be to the work that I do. When I assess my time, I don't see the value in using it to sit around and talk about people. Yes, just like anyone else I could see trolls attacking celebrities, I just never saw myself in a celebrity category so I would rationalize that it is not the same thing when it happens to me. I was clearly in denial. Once I began to honestly acknowledge it, I also began to consult with other celebrities on how they deal with it. What one particular celebrity shared with me was a game changer. They said, "People project their own insecurities on you. Sometimes people try to bait you into responding to some sh*t because your attention validates their importance. In a weird way they're looking for a cosign. They might be jealous or feel like they're less than you! You are an important person who is doing important work. I just keep it moving and don't even respond. They not on your level and don't even exist in your world for a reason, so keep it that way by not inviting them in."
Those within our community know that Fat Joe AKA Crack-Kim Great God Allah is not a farfetched concept. There is a reason we have the phrases Jive Percenters & Five Pretenders. I've had knowledge of self for thirty years now and have seen many versions of folks with one foot in the street and the other foot allegedly in Five Percenter culture. I have also seen those who are positive productive examples of what this culture can offer any human being. Like with any community, you have those who are striving to do better and others who are not. I also understand that we can want people to do better, yet nothing will change until they honestly want to do better for themselves. We make knowledge born and they must save themselves. Sometimes the ones who could benefit from our assistance the most are the least likely to openly receive it, for various reasons. All we can do is be there if/when people are ready and put up guardrails to prevent them from injuring us and others when they are not ready. I do not know what new indoor accommodations will be secured for our Universal Parliaments and other Nation events going forward. I also do not know what kind of effective policy and procedure can be put in place that will stop us from continually losing access to community spaces and sabotaging our relationships with important community partners. What I do know is this is an opportunity to do better. And sometimes what we see as a setback is a settlement or agreement to do something much greater! It is up to us to make that happen.
Peace,
Saladin
