When many of us think of Eric Benet, we think of the R&B crooner who gave us classic 90’s jams, like “Spend My Life With You.” We also think of him as Halle Berry’s ex-husband. In more recent years, he’s become known as the politically outspoken celeb’ who’s married to the ex-wife of Prince and always lets his Twitter fingers get tuh talkin.’ Typically the latter two aforementioned topics are what people usually talk about, but this go ’round it’s his photo of his adorable daughters and his controversial tweet about rappers and white supremacy that has the attention of many.
His Controversial Tweet
First up, we’ll start with the tweet that Eric Benet posted on August 5, 2018), in which he compared certain rappers to messengers of white supremacy.
In the meme he shared online, the message read: “If all you rap about is killing Black people, degrading Black women, abusing drugs, materialization, living a low life…you are not a artist, you are a Black face for White supremacy.” Eric then captured his post with this: “An inconvenient truth to some superstars.”
Following his tweet, many fans were down with Benet and his outlook on today’s hip hop, while a few were not, including rapper Azealia Banks:
azealiabanks- Ok so now do you guys want to listen to my very not destroying the black community raps about mermaids and seashells ?!
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Here’s the thing, I agree with what Eric Benet stated, but I’d also be lying if I said I didn’t think that rappers from back in the day, like N.W.A. and Tupac, weren’t guilty of some of the same things on his checklist list. Yet, they’re still some of the most legendary rappers ever and many of us, old schoolers, are guilty of vibin’ to their music at some point or another. So, I’m not sure if our generation would be considered the ‘pot’ and the youngins are the ‘kettle’ in this scenario. However, if we are the ‘pot calling the kettle black,’ I’d still take our REAL hip hop from back in the day, over a lot (not all) of this hot garbage being labeled as rap today…just saying. Movin’ on…
Meet Their Daughters
On to the beautiful family of Eric Benet and his wife, Manuela Testolini. Music icon, Prince, was married to Manuela from 2001 to 2006. That was Prince’s second and final marriage. Manuela later married Eric Benet in July 2011 and by December of that year, they had their first child together, Lucia Bella, and by 2014, their second daughter, Amoura Luna, was born. Eric also has a daughter from his prior relationship. In a rare move for the private family, Benet showed off their two mini-me’s on social media and they are TOO cute! See them gettin’ their kiddie swag on below…
Daddy’s little angels in Italy #Lucia #Luna ❤️❤️❤️❤️ pic.twitter.com/TmPRVZqAki
— Eric Benét (@ebenet) August 6, 2018
What Benet’s Wife Did For Her Ex, Prince
As we previously reported, after Prince’s passing in 2016, Manuela revealed that she’d learned many valuable lessons from him that she still leads her life by to this day. Although they amicably divorced in 2006, Manuela remained active in several of Prince’s philanthropic/humanitarian efforts, including his philanthropic organization, Love 4 One Another:
Via Rolling Stone– Testolini sought a position at Love 4 One Another because she liked how the organization operated. “They were doing projects ranging from building community gardens to helping domestic shelters. […] When Prince would visit different cities for a concert, he would have work going on to complement the places he visited,” [said Manuela Testolini]. If Prince had a Philadelphia show in the middle of winter, his organization would do a coat drive or a food drive nearby. […]
“He wanted to be a catalyst for other people,” she says. “He would see a family on TV that was having trouble – they didn’t have health insurance and had trouble meeting the needs of a sick child – and instead of saying, ‘Wow, that’s really sad,’ he would leave a note on my desk saying, ‘Call this TV station and find out where these people are so we can help them.’ It was ongoing.”
Today, Manuela Testolini follows in her ex-husband’s philanthropic footsteps. She’s launched TWO SCHOOLS in Africa, in honor of Prince (one of them is named after him). She said Prince always wanted to start a school of his own. After his death, she made it finally happen in October 2016 through her organization, In A Perfect World (a philanthropic organization Prince helped her to start and created the logo for).
