Here’s Why Other Inmates Didn’t Insult Oprah Winfrey Around Suge Knight

The Death Row Records co-founder revealed how he defended the media mogul’s name while behind bars.

by · The Root
Photo: Jesse Grant/WireImage, Jon Kopaloff/Getty Images for Paramount+ (Getty Images)

Suge Knight’s prison podcastCollect Call” has been controversial, to say the least. He’s had a lot to say about fellow Hip-Hop stars Dr. Dre, Akon and Diddy, but now he’s revealing a surprising story about one of the most powerful people in the world.

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According to Complex, on a recent episode, the Death Row Records co-founder explained that during one of his previous incarcerations, he physically handled a fellow inmate who disparaged media mogul Oprah Winfrey.

“I remember back in the day, doing time, when people said something bad about Oprah Winfrey. Shit, I got in their ass,” Knight said. “You talking about this Black woman. I fried their shit up, slapped the shit out of them—‘Don’t say nothing about this Black sister.’”

I guess it’s nice that he was defending her honor while locked up, but the way he spoke about her not having rappers on her popular talk show was uncomfortable. Did he expect her predominantly female audience to be okay with the offensive nature of some artists’ music? He also took umbrage at her support of the N.W.A. biopic “Straight Outta Compton.”

“At the same time, Oprah wouldn’t put rappers on her show, but Oprah promoted ‘Straight Outta Compton,’” he continued. “Even though Straight Outta Compton tried to kill me and had me doing time right now.”

He didn’t clarify why the film is the cause of his current 28-year sentence for a 2015 fatal hit and run.

This is absolutely the weirdest story we’ve heard all week. No one had “Suge Knight defended Oprah in prison” on their year-end bingo card. However, let’s be honest: Oprah is absolutely not concerned with what Knight says about her, and she definitely isn’t worried about prisoners bad-mouthing her.

Right now she’s busy with promoting “The Color Purple” and making sure people support her Favorite Things. Don’t expect her to comment on this, or anything involving Suge Knight.