The second he says "Why these young people need these messages through your voice" and "she was convinced", you know he's racist. Allow me to explain:
1. He never asked for her input. He wrote everything, and simply submitted it to her. He wanted her voice, not her thoughts.
2. He went into this ready to be defensive and do battle. You can see it in body language and his tone of voice. He's being very forceful. It's a "you will participate or else" attitude.
3. There's no gratitude in anything he says. He's only focused on HIS success of winning over her and what it meant to him.
4. "Through your voice" translates to "Because you're black".
5. "She was convinced" translates to "I own you".
Oh and the comment about her age was kinda rude too. Something about the way he said it. Now, we could argue it's because English isn't his first language but that argument only has so much reach. ESL has been used to explain away most of his past racist behavior.
It is super, super creepy. There's no humility there at all. When I listened to the song I thought Badu's vocals were meh, emotionless. Now we see why.
Edit: I also want to add that many features in the music industry are similar to this, in that an artist writes the whole song but can't sing one part and knows another person's voice would fit better. With NJ, I don't think that's what is going on here. Usually they contact someone they already know or are at least acquainted with. Usually people say things like they were excited to work together, or had been discussing collaborating for a long time, or had similar ideas so working together just made sense. Or any variation of that. The way NJ is talking in that interview, doesn't sound like that at all.
