Each year at the end of June, BET Entertainment television honors many acts of industry talents with signature awards and thanks them publicly for their hard work and dedication. The most remembered moment for the books was to actor and black lives activist Jesse Williams, who was presented with the humanitarian award. Due to the tragic events happening lately in the black community, Jesse's acceptance speech hit home for the people in the audience and viewers across the nation. His encouraging words were so powerful that many felt his spirit and presence through the television screen.
The next day, Wendy Williams decided to add this particular moment to her "hot topics" segment on her talk show. Williams quotes statements saying " I would be really offended if there was a school that was known as a historically white college. What if there was the national organization for white people, only? There's the NAACP."
Really, Wendy? You just had to go there! Bad idea! Viewers watching cringed and many could literally hear crickets in the studio audience. After saying this, I believe Wendy realized that she just may have said the wrong thing. However, it didn't stop there. Williams says, "Everybody's quiet. You're leaving me out here to dry by myself?" Pretty much! No one wanted to be caught dead agreeing with what this woman was saying!
Later, Williams was in the line of fire on social media as many of her supporters were absolutely angry and disappointed.
TV One network host, Roland Martin, was completely floored at Wendy's rant on her show and decided to school her on the history of HBCU and advise her to read a book and to "shut the hell up!" Martin said, "You sound utterly ignorant and you are an embarrassment to black people!" Viewers gave kudos to Roland and actually learned a bit about black history.
After hearing what was said, Williams called Martin to apologize and invited him to be a guest on her talk show, and of course he accepted it. Wendy admitted that she was scared for being wrong and apologized to Roland and her viewers for her remarks. During Martin's time on the show, he voiced that African Americans have only been free for forty-six years! He stressed that although African Americans were fully free on paper, to this day it is not our reality. "Historically Black Colleges and Universities allowed blacks to survive in America, although we built this country," Martin says.
I am so glad that this rant was settled and much history was brought to light. I can honestly say myself that I learned a lot from this and I feel blessed that in that moment of Martin's visit to Wendy, he handled things with a smile and hugs in the end.
