Juelz Santana just kicked up a firestorm online. And this one is a doozy. The moment people heard him say you don’t really need to read, the Internet went off. Now, to be clear, the Dipset star did not exactly stand on that, but he said enough. The clip shows him trying to make a larger point about business, money and knowing how to maneuver in the real world. But the way he framed…really made no sense. In fact, it was dumb.

Juelz basically implied that reading is optional in 2025. He leaned into the idea that financial literacy, owning a business and understanding money is more important than sitting down with a book. He pointed to audiobooks and YouTube clips as proof that you can “read” without actually reading. And that is when the conversation went into a debate.

The thing is, you cannot separate learning from literacy. It is in the very word. You cannot talk about financial literacy while downplaying literacy itself. That is like trying to bake a cake without flour. There is a foundational element that has to be there or the whole thing collapses into dust. But Juelz doubled down in that clip and suggested you can still make it without knowing how to read in the traditional sense.

People online were not having it. At all. Enslaved Africans were banned from reading for a reason. Knowledge opens doors. Reading is how you unlock that knowledge. A lot of folks felt Juelz was pushing the culture backward with his viewpoint.

To be fair, we get what he was trying to say. The world has changed. Technology has evolved. Information is everywhere. You can learn a lot on your phone. But telling kids reading is optional? That is dangerous territory. Relax on telling the kids not to read or that it does not matter, bruh.

Maybe he can apologize like he did for pushing lean to the kids.

The Dipset legacy is too iconic for Juelz to go viral for the wrong reasons. Kids, if you are reading this: there is nothing cooler than being able to read, think, question and understand the world around you.

The oppressors of the past knew that. The oppressors of the present know. We should know it even more.