My thoughts on Cam'ron's attack on Jay Z

[TragicallyInept]

Okay, I'm nobody. I get it. It's a hard reality to face, but I acknowledge that in reality, neither Cam'ron nor anyone else gives a sh*t what I think about this subject, but I shall put my two cents out anyway.

For awhile now there's been that swagger jacker audio out there ripping on Jay Z for supposedly stealing other people's lines, and recently Cam picked it up and ran with it, putting it on his mixtapes to attack Jay for a beef that he doesn't even belong in.

Let's get this straight. Cam doesn't have personal beef with Jay, it's all about Dame. Cam's cool with Dame, and feels he should step up for his man and rip on Jay for supposedly stealing Rocawear, Roca-fella, Kanye and other things from Dame.

Cam threw out the half-hearted explanation of how Jay was supposedly gonna try to get the video of Cam and Jim being jumped at Rucker and show it at his "I Declare War" concert, and then when Jay supposedly couldn't come up with anything, he flipped it and made the concert into a "peace" gathering, and made up with Nas.

But let's be honest here. If Cam is pissed because Jay DID NOT come after him? He's got some issues. It's all about the situation between Dame and Jay and Rocafella. There's a little bit about Cam supposedly gonna become President of Def Jam, but for the most part, Cam is jumping into someone else's beef, kinda like what 50 wanted Game to do when 50 had beef with Jada and Fat Joe for doing a video with Ja Rule. It's also similar to what Dre told Em NOT to do, when Suge was talking greasy about Dre, and Em wanted to jump into it and diss Suge.

So now that that's out of the way, let's address the swagger jacker allegations.

It's bullsh*t. That's all it is. You can't come up with anything on a man other than he's dropping similar verses, or recited lyrics into his songs? That **** ain't new. And it's not strictly limited to Jay, as Cam'ron knows because there is a Cam'ron version out there too, although not quite as long as the 7 minute version Cam put out on a mixtape.

This is not limited to rap music either. Comedians have long stolen bits from Richard Pryor, Lenny Bruce, Red Foxx, Eddie Murphy, Bill Cosby, Bill Hicks, Rodney Dangerfield and the list goes on.

In fact, recently after Pryor's sad passing, his wife Jennifer said the following: "His comedy is unparalleled. They say that you are not a comic unless you imitate Richard Pryor. ... He was able to turn his pain into comedy."

I mean Eddie Murphy is considered one of the funniest men who ever lived, and yet a lot of his act was directly influenced, and at some points liberally borrowed from Richard Pryor.

Back in Vaudeville days comedians often would basically lift skits and characters from each other's plays, and make changes, or alterations to them.

How many rappers out there have done this, though? I can't name them all, to be honest. It's as much a part of hip hop as is Sampling.

Yet, everyone wants to act all appalled at Jay Z for daring to "steal" Big's music, along with other artists. Don't you think if this was as big a deal as Cam is trying to make it out to be, that these artists would have done something before this? Maybe gone public and been like, "Yo Jay is stealing Big's sh*t, he's stealing MY Sh*t"?

I can't sum it up better than Jay's famous line, "I say a B.I.G. verse I'm only bigging up my brother"

It's the same thing Diddy does by continuing to bring up Big's name in songs, and videos, albeit in a less "raping the dead" kinda way. It's a way to keep your man's name alive and on the people's lips.

So when people hear a Jay Z song and they recognize a lyric they're like, "man, I remember that song!"

To be honest, after hearing Swagger Jacker, I went back and listened to Life after Death again, because I had forgotten just how good some of that album was.

So, Cam'ron, you need to realize you're only making a fool out of yourself with this. You're a rapper. You know the deal. You know that, as I said before, this is just as much a part rap music as sampling is.

And you portray yourself as a hypocrite, because as the Cam'ron version of that track shows, you've done the exact same thing.

So everyone needs to get off of Jay's ass over this, and just see it for what it is. Much needed publicity for Cam's album.

[bigted]

I have to agree with you here, Cam'ron looks hypocritical 'cause there's quite a bit of lines in his songs that were said by other rappers before, **** hits the fan really, it's not like his music is the most original either, there's quite a bit of elements that were talked about by other rappers, basically I think it's like when basketball players take moves by their heroes that they saw on TV growing up, it's really just paying homage to me, Will throws quite a bit of ol' school lines in his songs too and basically picked up on that feel good hip-hop style that artists like Sugar Hill Gang and Kurtis Blow incorporated earlier...

[Turntable]

Say watever you want.. But I find Cam`ron`s atitude hilarious. He has my full respect caus of stuff like that, lol

[JumpinJack AJ]

I didn't read that article and i don't follow either of their careers 2 closely. But when it comes 2 skillz, i ride with Cam'ron. When he came out, i followed him kinda closely and really liked alot of his songs. Even his more recents were decent. But after Jay-Z's 1st album, i didn't like him much at all. Jay-Z's attitude, music, and some of his actions are a joke 2 me. I'll read this article when i have more time...but looking at things as is...i favor Cam'ron.

[TragicallyInept]

not sure how you can favor Cam'ron in an argument that you haven't read, but...okay.

I recognize you like his skills and whatnot, but that's not what is at issue in the piece I wrote.