Now, the world don’t move
To the beat of just one drum,
What might be right for you,
May not be right for some.

(Different Strokes Theme Song)

It is a complicated proposition to get Black children to understand the concept of injustice. In fact, injustice and differences based on racial identity are some of the most foul-tasting things that Blacks, regardless of age, must endure. Despite what many may think, the swallowing of injustice is not an acquired taste. One never gets used to it.

There is no reasonable way of arguing against the reality that, as the Different Strokes theme song pinned above informed us, there are different strokes for different folks in America. Although this reality is unfair, it is the only one available to Black America.

As I watched the hostile takeover of the Capitol yesterday, I, along with millions of other fair-minded Americans, mused that under no circumstances would Blacks be allowed to do such things by any law enforcement agency. A Black uprising would have been dealt with in the same manner as Nat Turner’s rebellion, the Stono Rebellion, or John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry. Although I am well-aware that members of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense entered California’s State Capitol with weapons in 1967, the Panther invasion was child’s play compared to the attempted coup delusional Trump supporters failed to execute in front of a gawking world.

What occurred yesterday was only possible by Whites who have been privileged their entire lives. The treasonous activities of yesterday displayed a fervent belief that this is their nation in the mind of Trump supporters, and they are determining their destiny in the same manner that the Founding Fathers broke away from British tyranny.

Despite what many may wish were true, the harsh reality is that yesterday’s events are little more than what occurs to the minds of some White citizens who have lived in a world where white power is buttressed by a white privilege that has paved a path to white politico-economic monopolies. When this biased and unfair system is disrupted, well, all hell will break loose. We must not forget that these people were allowed to behave in the manner that they behaved in yesterday; there is no allowance for such activities from Blacks, the most oppressed group in this nation’s history.

At this moment where people around the globe are aghast at Trump supporters’ attempt to overturn a democratic election through force, Black America looks on with amused contempt and envy at the appearance of yet another unmistakable articulation of a blanket White privilege that covers all. In the end, it is yet another reminder that the world is unfair, and America decidedly bends towards whiteness, as it always has, regardless of one’s politics, socioeconomic status, or sexual orientation. I guess that it is true that

The world don’t move
To the beat of just one drum,
What might be right for you,
May not be right for some.

Dr. James Thomas Jones III

© Manhood, Race, and Culture, 2021.