Someone needed to spank
them for all that foul language. Didn’t
they have sense enough to know America was watching? Don’t they know children look up to them?
It took the diva of
Gospel Music to send them to the woodshed for an old fashioned whipping. It was the type I used to get when my mama
got tired of my trifling ways. “Go in
the back and pick out a switch,” she would say. “It better not be a little one.”
It's part of black folk
ritual that is shared by all with a black mama who told you to come home before
the street lights come on. Come home
late and prepare get a few licks for failing to abide by mama’s rules. Some of the performers at Sunday’s BET Awards
needed to be schooled on old time ways.
The language was so bad that entire performances were censored.
Enough was enough. The queen stood up and reminded them of big
mama’s ways. “We need all of ya’ll,” Yolanda Adams started. You could feel the spanking coming. “I’m saying
the world needs everyone in this room.
Please make sure that you use your gift responsibly, ‘cause we’re watching. Our babies are watching, and they want to be
like us.”
Amen sister! Call them to task for forgetting they’re on
national television and viewers from around the globe are taking notice of how
they act in public. Tell them to act
like they have some home training. Tell
them not to make the family look bad and to remember babies are watching
them. Tell them not to forget that the
Lord has blessed them to be on stage.
You better tell them sister!
Sister Yolanda went
there after Rick Ross performed with his Maybach Music Group and Nicki Minaj’s
performance and acceptance speech for her third consecutive best female hip-hop
artist award. Being thug was on
display. What was up with that? Did someone send out a memo to put in motion
a competition for best display of obscenity during a national broadcast?
The actions of a few
distracted from the highlight of the night – Cissy Houston singing her heart
out in memory of her daughter. If you
didn’t cry after that, God help you. It
was a call to worship. It was a moment of
praise and worship. Yes, Mama Cissy took
us to church. Mariah Carey, Monica,
Chaka Khan, Brandy and Gary Houston, Whitney’s brother, joined the worship
experience. Members of the cast of Waiting to Exhale – Angela Bassett, Lela
Rochon and Loretta Devine – added a tribute to the fallen angel.
It was one of those
special moments that black folks do best.
It’s one of the great contributions that we, as a people, bring to this
great union we call America. We know how
to bring faith to the forefront. We
blend our faith in all we do. The song
may not come from a Gospel label, but faith will ooze out if you give it a
chance. Sunday’s stage was set up to
worship God for Whitney’s life. Others
have done the same. This was not the
Academy Awards or one of the other award shows.
It was the black community’s time to bring God on stage and lift Whitney
up in a way that reflects more than her music.
Can the church please say Amen?
It was appropriate for
Queen Yolanda to speak. Shut up all that
noise. Honor this moment children. Don’t you know the babies are watching? Don’t you understand to whom much is given,
much is required. More than that, listen
to me now, don’t you know God is watching?
It’s a lesson that some
can’t hear due to their obsession with being seen and heard. There are those moments when you have to bow
to a higher will. The will is a purpose
beyond your claim to fame and fortune.
Bow to the voice that touched us, moved us with both lyric and
passion. Remember the tears that enthused
so many to sing. Remember the force of
that song The Greatest Love of All.
How many were moved by that?
God was in that voice.
Stop all that cursing
and remember what God has done for you!
One more thing children –
don’t limit it to one night. Act like
you know who holds you up. That’s what
mama taught you.
I wish they would
listen.
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