Ice Cube to Bill Maher: ‘Check yourself before you wreck yourself’

Rapper Ice Cube has some advice for comedian Bill Maher in light of last week’s N-word controversy, hearkening back to a catchy refrain from his 1993 single “Check Yo Self.”

“Everybody feels like they can make a joke and cross that line. You can make a joke about everything, but everything ain’t funny,” Ice Cube told Rolling Stone, the music magazine reported Thursday. 

“And he wants to talk about ’house [N-word],’ like they had it so much better? … It’s like, please. It wasn’t a cakewalk for a so-called ’house [N-word],’ either, unless you like being raped. Sometimes, you gotta know when to shut up. Check yourself before you wreck yourself.”

Ice Cube, who will be an interview guest on this Friday’s edition of HBO’s “Real Time,” promised that he will “say what I gotta say” when he appears on Mr. Maher’s show.

Mr. Maher, a political liberal, apologized for his joke, made on his June 2 program, in which he told Nebraska’s Sen. Ben Sasse that he was averse to visiting the Cornhusker State to do some hard work in the corn fields because he’s “a house [N-word].”

“[R]ich, white guys are the reason why black people are in the position they’re in,” Ice Cube told Rolling Stone, seeming to have Mr. Maher in view. “You’re supposed to be a champion, or you’re supposed to be a liberal, but racism lives in both parties. It does. So let’s throw away the facade and the bulls—. Let’s be real.”

Besides Ice Cube, Mr. Maher will also interview African-American academic and political pundit the Rev. Michael Eric Dyson, who on Saturday defended the HBO host as “a champion of many fights for black justice.”

“Given the Bill Maher I know, he will use this opportunity to strengthen his role as an ally to black people,” Mr. Dyson said in the statement posted to Twitter on June 3.