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A Different Take For The Winter Holidays

Once again as we approach the Winter Holidays, a reminder that this is the time to get help when needed and 

there’s no shame in it. Be well and be safe. And as a mantra when I see family and friends for a meal,  I remember all of 

the despicable things I’ve done to keep my finger from wagging:

How I stayed quiet during the AIDS crisis thinking, ‘Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time’ and all the damage 

done by that collective reasoning. When the b word flowed from my mouth and I thought myself superior because I 

NEVER said the c word. How rapes are rampant because I didn’t stand up when someone said, ‘Well what was she 

wearing and what was she doing there?’ How the conditioning is so ingrained that any dispute with money 

and my first thought is, ‘Well, he’s Jewish, so...’ and then I’m reminded of what folk think of me. Not ME me but Black 

me. Scripture teaches that in order to be my best self, I have to expose and repent of my worse. So when you see 

your friends and family, remind them of your worse self and level the ground between you. Every year during this time, 

folk do the ‘white people thing’ and talk about how they’re gonna set their friends and family straight. It’s a running 

Winter holiday meme that needs to die the death. Like believing that if they somehow get rid of 45, things will go 

back to the way they were - racism’s previously intolerable levels. And that would be ok with them. How long are we 

gonna keep fooling ourselves? ‘America is corrupt and corrupted and conditioned to be so, but because of my 

superior intellect and upbringing, I stand immune’. We’ve got to stop falling for the same shtick season after season 

and year after year. It’s like there’s some sort of spell preventing folk from seeing the obvious. Either we break 

the spell or the spell breaks us. Can’t wait ‘til we have our own media. Everything changes. 

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