The Diddy indifference is too similar to Black men who voted for Trump
While there are a sizable number of Black men who DO NOT deserve to be in prison, some earned it
It’s been two weeks since I watched TUBI’s “TMZ Presents: The Downfall of Diddy His Defense,” and the flippant response from two of three Black men involved in the mock trial of Sean “Diddy” Combs still makes my skin crawl. In the mock trial, they were told to discuss charges against the Bad Boy founder:
Count 1: Racketeering Conspiracy
Count 2: Sex Trafficking by Force, Fraud or Coercion
Count 3: Transportation to Engage in Prostitution
They debated what could be considered a ménage à trois, polyamory or forced sex at Diddy’s “Freak Offs,” along with him bringing in non-Americans as additional sex partners. They brought up how you “can’t unwatch” the domestic violence footage of Diddy against Cassie Ventura.
The results of the mock trial:
Count 1: six guilty, six not guilty
Count 2: 10 guilty, two not guilty
Count 3: Unanimous (12 guilty)
When TMZ founder Harvey Levin asked the mock jurors whether Diddy should do any prison time, the forewoman immediately spoke up about how he’d gotten too many passes before and was a danger to women. Then, one of the two Black men spoke up to Levin and said, “Your question about whether he should do time is challenging because I don’t know if he should do time.”
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After Levin asked if the “racial component” was the reason the juror (Black, gray-haired, middle-aged man with locks) hesitated, he immediately blurted out, “Oh, there’s no doubt about it” while another Black male juror (in his late 20s/early 30s) looked into the camera and nodded profusely. The first juror stated, “There’s enough brothas in jail. They don’t need to — I mean, there’s enough.”
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And my head jerked back like I’d been the one who was hit. To just sum it up as “there’s enough” after seeing video footage of a Black man clearly kicking, punching, dragging and forcing a Black woman to return to his hotel room like a real-life caveman was disturbing.
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While I agree with the belief that there are far too many Black men in prison, my hesitation is imprisoning nonviolent criminals, specifically marijuana users and sellers before and after 24 states legalized marijuana for recreational use and 39 states allow it for medical use. Why is anybody affiliated with marijuana still in there with actual criminals?
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But listening and watching these two men brush off prison time after seeing that video of Diddy treating a grown woman like a rag doll was alarming to me. It was the kind of attitude that made it all too obvious how Diddy got away with this behavior for a decades-long relationship.
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It also reminds me too much of Black men who run to defend Andrew Schulz’s “black girlfriend effect” jokes and voted for Trump, completely dismissing all of the women’s rights that the current man in the Oval Office promised to take away “whether the women like it or not.” Race will always outrank gender for white women who voted for Trump, but I can’t make sense of the 20% of Black men who voted for Trump. To choose race over gender with him would still put them on the losing end — and is a middle finger to Black mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, nieces and platonic women friends. And it feels like Diddy and Black Men for Trump don’t give a damn.