Do Unto Others

On Sunday night at the Billboard awards show, Miguel, in a very misguided attempt to outperform the other artists, jumped over the crowd and landed on a woman, snapping her neck back.  Within minutes, the entire Black internet community was creating memes about it, making fun of it, laughing at her pain.  First and foremost, and hear me clearly, just like your grandmother used to tell you, it is not funny to laugh at someone else’s pain.  It’s simply not funny.  She wasn’t walking down the street when she stumbled over a crack, she could have been seriously injured, paralyzed or killed even.  There’s nothing comical, funny, amusing, or entertaining about someone being hurt.  I almost can’t believe I have to say it but if you don’t want it happening to you, or someone you love, and you wouldn’t appreciate someone laughing about it if it happened to someone you know, you shouldn’t be laughing at it.  We, as a society and culture have de-evolved to the point of insanity, where it’s funny to laugh at someone being hurt.  That’s sick and it’s sad.  The tenants of every world religion says “Do unto others.”  But what’s MORE disturbing is the number of people who justified, rationalized, and defended laughing at her pain.  There is something tragically wrong with a society where people can’t say, “Hey, you know what, I was wrong, I’m sorry.”  And finally, the entire situation was sexist.  “Bitches be like, Tricks be like, Chicks be like.”  What did she do to deserve being called a bitch?  Standing near the stage was her crime?  If he had landed on a male, the commentary would have been about how Miguel needed a beatdown.  Black people, we should be ashamed of our collective behavior and sadly we aren’t.  We are doomed as a people if we can’t show the most basic compassion and empathy.