Well folks, I solved the problems of why this country got itself into this sorry state (and the world followed)! In one evening at the annual Turkey-fest dinner in the fabulous home of people I’ll call my Fabulous Family, I think I finally understood how wypipo have come to hate Black people. By the way, I didn’t get permission to explain this publicly, so I’ll just use nicknames. So, let me just set the scene for you:

This family has hosted this event almost fifteen consecutive Thanksgiving holidays. And after much concerted, often orchestrated, efforts of (mainly) the womenfolk, seven big tables had been set with charger plates, dinner plates, bread plates, linen napkins upon nice linen tablecloths, and real silverware; the food was blessed. Mind you, everyone knew what they needed to do, or saw what needed done and did it. There was barely a raised eyebrow during the whole process, but there was MUCH laughing and joking going on.

Around the time most of the people (maybe a little under about 50 people in the headcount) had finished stacking their plates with second and third rounds back at the food stations, and everyone was deep into the mountain of desserts, people began piling up to-go boxes (also provided by the hosts). Few people drank and the hardest drink was beer.

Now it was fun time; time for the traditional concert that this Fabulous Family (FF) puts on annually. Host mom, Mrs. Doc, is very proud of this FF (and rightly so) which is stacked deep in generations of great artists of singers, soloists, musicians, and DJs. There is no lack of talent, nor musical ambition in this FF. They were all born ready and able. So… that night…

Mar (in her 20s) was killing it on vocals (ooooo, vocals that give you chills)! Rho (mother of Britt) wasn’t slacking either. Britt (also in her 20s) had to be cajoled into singing, but she didn’t have to be cajoled into doing background for most of the songs the others sang, with the intermittent help of little Jordy (who, at 11 years, can belt with the best of them). Robbie (sister to Rho and mother of Mar and Jordy) punched the sky in vocals to start it off [no room for the holiness dance]. And Doc, dad/granddad, showed his flare as he zipped through “The Girl From Ipanema” on the organ; we shoulder dances like Ethiopians in our chairs.

Then… there was Miss J’s group (NOTE: For some reason, all the white folks sat at one table designated specifically for them nearest the front door in chairs marked “reserved.” Didn’t figure that out; didn’t ask for an explanation). Now, Jean and her family have been acquainted with this FF for years and have attended this holiday function for almost as long as they’ve held it, so why they were separate I have no clue (nor care).

Anyway, this year Miss J’s family brought a cute little friend-girl who envisions herself a singer. Lawd! From what I could hear, the child couldn’t carry a note if she paid someone to help her with it (but she had the guts to try). She “sang” a couple of songs, the first of which she kept losing her key and her part (even though Mar patiently held the phone (with the song on it) before her so she could see the words). My daughter, who sat closest to her, said that although she didn’t do too well then, at least she wasn’t tone deaf, and she needed a LOT of practice. That was generous.

The second time around she got up more nerve and wanted to do that new type of “singing” recently named “cups.” Now, a cups song (bonafide wypipo’s music) is a new form of rhythmic singing; it is snappy-fast and coordinated, and mainly consists of the hollow snap of the mouth of a cup hitting a flat (wood/metal) surface, accompanied by the sharp clap of the hands in a fast moving, rhythmic fashion, which is (ordinarily) a nice sounding accompaniment. But little friend-girl made very little noise when she was supposed to bang the cup (losing 1/3 of the effects) and almost no sound when she (almost) clapped her hands, which lost another 1/3 of the effects because the voice is supposed to round it out by being the last 1/3. So, in summary: she’d flip the cup on a cloth-covered table, quietly, “almost” clap her hands, then issue out weak “notes” (trying to modulate). The group encouraged her and clapped for her efforts. I used this time to gather plates.

Then little J (Miss J’s son) wanted his turn in the songfest. Keep in mind that any effort he makes will be championed because he is a sweet, cheerful, teenaged boy with some challenges who rarely separates his teeth even to talk, and loves country western music (as does Rho, by the way). For him, Chelle (sister to Rho and Robbie) turned the volume waaay up on the background soundtrack, but it wasn’t high enough to make it much better so I used that time to gather napkins and silverware. Personally, I think he wasn’t too bad so I cheered and clapped for his enthusiasm along with the rest of them, because—he deserved that (even I don’t have the nerve to sing in front of all that talent).

When I wasn’t clearing up I sat and recorded the FF’s young ladies actually sing and Doc play one song on the organ that made us bounce in our seats; I just enjoyed the hell outta the concert.

Then, quite unexpectedly, a singular, strong thought entered my mind as I watched the wypipo–watch the FF young ladies and Doc (he kilt-ted that organ!!) entertain the crowd as they showcased their enormous, collective, wealth of talents.

It occurred to me that eons ago, wypipo picked Black folks to enslave after they saw these larger-than-life kinds of talents that Black people (innately) have and realized on some unconscious level just how weak they (many, many of them) are in comparison and decided, subconsciously, that they needed to control those talents; to profit from all those gifts and skills. I mean, even back then there were wypipo having to use special made tools to make stuff, but imagine how gob-smacked they were when they saw a Black man whittle a doll, a fiddle, perfect figurines, guitars, or even a drum with a singular, semi-dull pocket knife. Then, factor in that in spite of making it unlawful to teach Black people to read, some were smart enough to figure it out and learned on their own (like my oldest brother did) by teaching themselves to read simply by observing in the shadows what the wypipo did without those same wypipo understanding just how smart their shadowed audience was.

In that moment, I generalized them as they generalize Black people–into one singular group, while denying them an individual identity. I look at them as they do us–as if we have no significant within-group distinctions. I wondered if that’s what’s fueled them for generations to keep Black folk from out-shining, out-doing, out-performing them in life–in general? Granted, there have been many white people contributors to the growth of the world, but who can say with unproven certainty that none of those contributors carried enough Black DNA to make those contributions possible or worthy? Let that sink in.

And we, Black folk, don’t help our own situation because we’ve been cheering their weaknesses for generations as if by doing so white people will work harder to get better—be better people. As if they, after seeing our collective brilliance, will recognize that we are now, and have always been, strong contributors to all that this nation has produced, created, and thereby, progressed from. As if by doing so that wypipo, in turn, will step back, acknowledge those contributions, and let us be. They haven’t, and with their faulty thinking of somehow being superior, they can’t, because they are limited, no–controlled–by that very thought that all they have to be is–born, and somehow that makes them superior. Think about that, just by birth you are superior in thought, word, and deed, without any work to improve your condition, and you are better than a whole continent of people. How tainted, tarnished, faulty, is that!

Yup, I thought all that in those moments. I felt that I finally understood what I imagined started all those years of slavery and degradation, Jim Crow years, segregation, and public executions to anyone who dared to show talents, intelligence, or evidence an interior brightness that couldn’t be tolerated so had to be snuffed out, the consistently inconsistent give-and-take social systems which continue to make Black people, in particular, people of color in general, socially paranoid; all of it came into focus.

I concluded that:

1-They (generalized wypipo) have operated on a subconscious belief that if they kill the light, they stifle the people (whereby they continue to underestimate us all),
2-dolt45 is their weakest link (which has no impact of their unwavering support and loyalty),
3-“And their weakest link shall lead them” must be in the wypipo’s Bible (Dotoallofme 12:2-48) somewhere,
4- They’re very insecure people (as a group—who else would follow the weakest link except lemmings?),
5-Petty minds breed petty people.

6- Like lemmings, the petty minds are still breeding and regenerating that same pre-colonial ignorance of how the world works (but never really has).

Boy, what an evening of revelations!