Latest / Color Commentary / Ep 44 | Two Things Can Be True

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Ep 44 | Two Things Can Be True · Color Commentary

• Charles Cole: Welcome to Color Commentary, a podcast where the stories shaping our world are told in black and white first, and then we dig into their deeper meaning in full color. Each week I'll be bringing you news like this. First, we'll start with what I like to call the black and white section, a clear, straight shooting rundown of the facts and the tradition of grace like Ed Bradley, Walter Cronkite, and the classic voices of journalism. Then we'll shift into the color commentary section where I add my own personal opinions and insights. ⁓ and sometimes it'll just be me. Sometimes we'll have guests, but we're gonna figure that stuff out together as we go. And I say this all the time, but I read a lot of books, I watch a lot of movies, ⁓ I like scholarly stuff, I like pop stuff. You're gonna get all these aspects of me, man. I'm a hip hop head, all that stuff. So come with your full self because I'm gonna be my full self, and I appreciate our audience for rocking with me and and and ⁓ bringing themselves to it. With that said, let's get into it. So today I got two different stories. ⁓ and on the surface, they're about 60 years apart, give or take, right? And they're underneath the same question: like who gets to read, who gets to be heard, and who gets to be free? It's dramatic, but I need a hook to bring you in. Okay. So stick with us. But story one is on your timelines right now. It's a teacher who is also an a social media influencer who broke down crying because his seniors couldn't read and went viral. ⁓ and then it got pretty complicated. ⁓ and I have thoughts. Surprise, surprise. I have multiple thoughts actually. And then story two is a woman that I need more of you. To know about ⁓ Fannie Lou Hamer. And I know many of you know that name kind of in your ether. ⁓ but I really want to just dive into her and why I appreciate this woman so much. You saw a few episodes ago, while back, ⁓ I compare Miss Sarah Carpenter, ⁓ and I call her the modern day Fannie Lou Hamer. So I'm gonna go a little bit more into her and her sixth-grade education and just how she became one of the most powerful voices that this country's ever produced. And As always, I'm gonna give you the facts on both first, in black and white. Then I'm gonna tell you exactly what I think in full color. All right? I think I introduced it well enough, Tommy. So with that being said, segment one, The Teacher Who Cried. I wanted to say Teacher Who Cried Wolf for some. I wanted to do a play on it. I'm just not clever enough, and it was time to record. So segment one is called The Teacher Who Cried. Here are the facts. Black and white. So on Tuesday, August 11th, 2026, a Houston teacher named Darius Williams posted an emotional video to Instagram during his lunch break. Williams is known online as Darius Cooks. ⁓ he's a food influencer with a pretty large following, much larger than mine. And according to Houston Public Media and Fox 26 Houston, he is listed in the staff directory at Phyllis Wheatley High School. In Houston's fifth ward as a career and technical education teacher in the Houston Independent School District. In the video, Williams said he broke down in class on the second day of school. He said he gave his seniors a short exercise, right? And the exercise was to read a few paragraphs, then finish a sentence he had already modeled for them. He said that 17 and 18-year-olds cannot fill in four words. And the clip has now reached millions of views and set off a national conversation about literacy. You know what? Let me just show you the video. I'm on my small spike, it I know, eleven thirty or something like that, and I just finished a three hour class. ⁓ we have what's called block, and block is where first and second periods combined, subjects that need it. And so ⁓ I literally broke down in the middle of class because I'm teaching seniors. These kids leaving high school and going to college, hopefully, after they finish. We had two paragraphs to read, one sentence complete to write. I gave them the sentence stamps. I basically figured the sentence for them in the Bible. These are 17 and 18-year-old kids. And they couldn't fill in four words. Four words. I gave them the scenario. We annotated together. I gave them the answers before we even had the problem. And they couldn't do it. I don't know. I simply don't know where the problem is. This is only day two. And I have seniors who simply cannot read, and seniors who cannot write. They cannot write. They can reason. They have the ability to defend their reasoning if it's talking to their homeboy, but applying that to a written text, two paragraphs. They couldn't do it. Our young black men, our young brown man. Our young black girls. You know, young brown girl. ⁓ God. Gonna let that breathe for a little bit. So then, so that was him. ⁓ and then the story got a little bit more complicated, right? Days later, according to the Houston Public Media and the Texas Education Agency's newly released ratings, Wheatley High School earned an A in the state's accountability system. The state-appointed Houston Superintendent Mike Miles was asked about the video and pushed back on the idea that this was news, saying the problem was worse four years ago and that addressing it is exactly why the district is doing the work it's been doing. A former Wheatley English teacher, Tracy Way Toussaint, who says she taught many of the current seniors for two years, disputed Williams' characterization. As reported by the Atlanta Black Star and Your Web. Or EUR Web, I don't know how to pronounce it. I want to get it right. She described those students as among the strongest readers and writers Wheatley has seen in a long time. Said that they had completed ⁓ advanced and college-level work and accused Williams of using her students to gain followers. Several Wheatley students told Houston Public Media they did not like him broadcasting the issue. Williams also carries a documented history away from the classroom. According to Houston Public Media and the Better Business Bureau reporting cited by TPR, he has faced numerous consumer complaints, lawsuits, and scam allegations tied to his food business, including customers who said they pay for cookbooks, cookware, or event tickets that they never received, and he previously ran businesses in Atlanta, including a credit repair service. Williams has defended his standing as an educator, pointed to his certifications and his graduate study. Okay. Now, the wider picture, because the crisis he pointed to is is a real one. Okay, it just is with or without him. Whether he is clout chasing or not, or whatever they call it, there is an issue. So according to the 2024 Nations Report Card, the National Assessments for Educational Progress, roughly 30% of fourth graders and 29% of eighth graders in this country read at or above proficiency. Reading scores fell in both grades compared to 2022 and no state posted reading gains. So for black students, the numbers are a bit sharper. About 17% of black fourth graders and about 14% of black eighth graders read at or above proficiency. More than 60% of black eighth graders score below the NAEP basic level, or NAPE. I say NAPE. 12th grade reading hit an all-time low, and black 12th graders' reading dropped about 11 points, nearly twice the decline of their white peers. And this doesn't stop at graduation. A Gallup analysis of federal data found that roughly 130 million American adults, about 54% of those between 16 and 74, have low literacy skills. And about one in five adults is functionally illiterate. Let me tell you that one more time. About one in five adults is functionally illiterate, right? So here are the facts as they stand. Let's just recap. A teacher and an influencer cried on camera about seniors who couldn't read. That happened. Days later, the school earned an A. A former colleague called those students strong, and some students objected to being broadcast. That's two. Number three, the messenger has a history of complaints and scam allegations. And then finally, underneath all of it, the literacy crisis is real, is national, it hits every single group, and it lands pretty hard in our community, the black community. Okay? So I've been naming all my sources so you can go look at it. Again, just in case you want to look it up for yourself, and you should go and look at Houston Public Media, Fox 26 Houston, TPR, Atlanta Black Star, your web. The Texas Education Agency and the 2024 NAPE scores. I use those nape scores a lot. So some of this stuff wasn't pretty hard to wasn't hard to find. Okay? Now that's the news. That was the black and white section. Now let's talk about it because you are listening to color commentary with Dr. Co. So, as always, I have a few different thoughts on this story. And in this segment, I'm gonna call this two things can be true. That's the entire frame for me, okay? I like like a thing can be real, and that person can be pretty complicated and don't doing things for the wrong reason. So let's start off with that. This crisis is very real, and I'm not gonna soften it. ⁓ Just because of public discourse. We are in a literacy crisis. We we just are. Every single race is impacted. Okay? I want to say that. It's not just black kids, it's not just black, it's every single race. I want to just put that out there. And also, I am a black man. And I tend to focus on my community, black people. I focus on I I I will do research on everybody, I talk about everybody, but when I'm having these conversations, I talk to black people. Especially our boys and our young men. So it's not a contradiction. It's just a lane. I wanted to just state that though, because a lot of the people that were critiquing or having this conversation felt that it was anti-black or he was or or or when we talk about literacy race, we're degrading black people. And and I love black people. It's kind of kinda kinda dedicated my life to it. ⁓ not saying I don't fall short in certain ways. But I have you have to talk about these things. And ⁓ the other part of that is this concept of content over everything, which I don't agree with. And I don't agree with this the person that posted this in the way that they did it, ⁓ in certain ways, right? Because, you know, kids in school shouldn't just be fodder for content. ⁓ they shouldn't. And there's become an industry of teachers, mainly young ones though, that are using The shortcomings of their students or their teaching ⁓ as fodder for content because they don't really want to be educators. They want to be content creators, and that's their gateway into being bigger content creators. All right. I I don't I don't like cameras being set up in a classroom for multiple anger angles and teachers that are filming while they teach in order to kind of make this broader point or this broader judgment about the students that they serve. Okay. ⁓ again, it's it's it's becoming an economy. And so the other thing that you add to this, I I would probably feel different if the students were in on it and the students knew that this was happening and wanted to be part of it. Like I do think there is some wholesome educational content with educators, right? I do. ⁓ one one person I can think of was the teacher that had the young students and basically had them talking very Positively and powerfully about themselves and projecting positivity out about what they wanted to be. I love that. I thought that that was beautiful. ⁓ so again, nuance is a word that is fading from our existence, but it still exists as long as I'm doing a show. So we can do that. ⁓ but these kids said that they did not want to be part of that. They did not like it and they wasn't feeling it. So you got to respect their minds. The other thing is the messenger and the message, okay? The school got. ⁓ a former teacher that said that these are strong readers. And this content creator has a history. Look, I don't know this content creator. I'm not a person that follows it. ⁓ his his cooking stuff is just not ⁓ my thing. It's not for me. If I knew him, I would talk more about it. ⁓ but apparently he's been called a scammer. Do I know if he scammed anybody? I don't. ⁓ the Better Business Bureau has reports of him being a scammer, right? So Now we have to deal with the the complicated issue of what if the message is right but the messenger is wrong? Do you throw out the message? And I think that sometimes we do do that. I think in in in very foolish ways. And and I I don't know what your belief system is or whatnot, but you know, it kind of goes back to, you know, he he he would know let he would know sin, you know, cast the first stone or whatever. I think that you can always discredit somebody in today's world. I I just think you can. It's just a different world. Like everything people duh do is online. ⁓ and a lot of people are living for cameras and living for the public's perception of them. And it's it's unavoidable. And as much as I s say I don't and try not to, I know that that creeps in my psyche. I know that I'm curious about that or I don't want to be mis you know, misunderstood or have my words taken out of context and mis misperceived, right? So I get it. I understand. ⁓ But still, we have to have a place to discuss the literacy crisis and what that means. Now, crying versus doing is the piece that I had to discuss this on, because that's where a lot of critiques went, right? Like, yo, tears are not a plan, brother. Like, where's the line between raising awareness and performing concern? Because everything is a performance now. You know, what would actually helping these kids look like? You know, what does it look like? What's your plan on day two? What's the plan on on on on on day sixty, right? How are you gonna like fix that? And maybe if you added that in, maybe it would feel a little bit different. ⁓ the other thing that I would add to, and as I talked about nuance, is somebody might argue and they would be in their right to is that, well, him performing is the reason why y'all are having this conversation. You know, hey man, ⁓ maybe that's true. I I I I talk about literacy all the time. I just did a ⁓ two or three talks in the Bay Area talking about literacy, talking directly to teachers, ⁓ and lifting them up and and talking about the job at hand and and and distinguishing between, you know, is this is this a job for you or is this a vocation? Because if this is a job, I'm gonna talk to you differently than if it's a vocation. Which is a different conversation. I don't know. If I could Tommy, if I can find The speeches, I think, I think it they were recorded or maybe pieces of them were recorded, but if I can, I'll upload them. I'll I'll I'll send them to you. Maybe we can do something with ⁓ because I do think that they could be good. ⁓ but let me close out this piece of the conversation, right? I think that that guy was performative. I do think he was performing. I think it was a hot button issue, and I think that he utilized his skills as a social media influencer or as some people would say, scammer. I don't know you, brother. I'm not calling you a scammer. I don't know you. I have no, I'm not trying to set stir up no smoke with anybody. Now there's a conversation that's happening, but the conversation has left the issue. Of literacy and why we need to be able to read and the struggles that we got to being able to read and why it's so important. And again, I say this all the time: literacy is not just the ability to read, it's the ability to read and comprehend, and read and comprehend multiple texts to form new ideas and new thoughts. And another part of literacy is also now being able to take the new ideas that you have and communicate them out to the world in in the written word. And we are losing that. It's being lost. It's it's being lost. and if you were working in a public education school system and you use that as a stepping stone to start your social media career, I don't love that. I don't. I don't like it. People get to where they get to, how they get there. You know, I far be it for me to judge, I don't like it. ⁓ But it is what it is. So where I'm landing on this is look, forget the theatrics, forget the tears, forget all that stuff. Engage with where we are with literacy, though. Engage in us going backwards and us declining in certain ways, right? And if we say that we love these kids, we say we love our communities, being able to read is part of that. It it it just really is. And I want you all to be more informed. I talk about this at Nauseam. So what I'm gonna ask is that in the comments, give me your thoughts. You tell me if you think that lyricy race for our people is a big deal. Or not. I actually, you know what, for the people that don't think it's a big deal, tell me why you why it's not a big deal. You know, tell tell let me know. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm missing something. ⁓ Yeah, I don't have a cool way to end this one. because I'm still thinking about it. It's something that's very personal to me. ⁓ I was in those AP classes. I I had good jet good grades, and then I got to college with a quality professor who looked at my product and was like, we got a long way to go. And I was pissed because how am I getting A's and A P classes and Bs? And then I get to college and I have to go back and do remedial classes or remediation. There is a problem here. And I'm in my early 40s. This problem is persistent and it's getting worse in a lot of ways. Okay. I'm done with segment one. It's segment one, people. We're done with segment one. Now let's go to segment two. ⁓ Fanny Lou Hamer. I love Fannie Lou Hamer. She is one of my favorite historical figures. It is somebody that reminds me of my grandmother. She is somebody that I reference a lot, especially when I'm working in communities, and somebody tells me what they can't do, or because they don't have formal education, or because they're not the strongest of readers and all that stuff, that they can't have an impact. And I say bullshit because Fannie Lou Hamer existed. And I'm not just saying any old body can do what Fanny Lou Hamer did, because she is special. But what she should be is an inspiration to all of us. That if you really care about something and something really is your vocation, you figure out how to do it. Let me let's let's talk about who she is. Cause again, a lot of people think they know Fanny Lou Hamer. They don't know Fanny. Well, I the way I say that, I don't know Fanny like that either. I didn't like meet her. I was dead when she I was I was Not born when she died, but ⁓ but I do love this lady. So here are the facts. Black and white. Then something magical happens and we're black and white now. It's great. Fanny Lou Hamer was born October 6, 1917, in Montgomery County, Mississippi, the youngest of 20 children born as sharecroppers. Her family moved to Sunflower County to work the land. She started picking cotton as a small child and left school around the sixth grade to work the fields full-time. She later married Perry Hamer, known as Pap, and spent nearly two decades as a sharecropper and plantation timekeeper. In 1961, She went in for surgery and a white doctor sterilized her without her consent. The practice was so routine in Mississippi that she later gave it a bitter name, the Mississippi appendectomy. In the summer of nineteen sixty two, Hamer attended a meeting and learned at 44 years old that she had a right to vote. On August 31, 1962, she went to register in Indianola. The plantation owner told her to withdraw or leave. She left that night, telling him she had not tried to register for him. She had tried to register for herself. Soon after, night writers fired into a home where she had stayed. She became a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, also known as SNCC. In June 1963, returning from a voter education workshop, she was arrested in Winona, Mississippi, and Beaten so severely in the jail that it left permanent damage to her body. In 1964, Hamer co-founded and became vice chair of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, created because the state's Democratic Party barred black participation. That August, on the 22nd, she testified before the Credentials Committee at the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, describing the beating and the daily terror of trying to vote. President Lyndon B. Johnson called a last minute press conference to pull her off live television. The networks carried her testimony in full on the evening news anyway, in front of a far larger audience than she had, than that a much bigger audience than she would have reached live. And her closing line was: if the Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America. Her most quoted truth came from that same fight. I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired. So I know you probably heard your parents or your grandparents say that. That's who made it famous, baby. Fanny Lou. In 1969, she founded the Freedom Farm Cooperative in Sunflower County, buying land so poor families could grow their own food and stand on their own ground. She ran for office more than once and she kept organizing until the very end. Fanny Lou Hamer died of cancer on March 14, 1977, at 59 in Mississippi. She was buried at the Freedom Farm she built. And her hairstone carries her own words. In 2025, she was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. Okay? I got those sources from Britannica, Blackpost.org, Stanford King Institute, and National Women's History Museum. And PBS News Hour. That's who she was in black and white. Now let me tell you why I love her and why she lives in me. We're back to color, baby. So to me, she's bigger than a textbook figure. ⁓ you know, she's a blueprint of what's possible. She is a modicum of agency. She's she's agency personified, you know, and and It's about her voice and how she spoke and her cadence, and she had this moral clarity it that didn't need degrees behind it. It didn't need validation. She was who she was, and and and the truth just cut through every time that she spoke. And tying this back to the first segment, this woman only had a sixth grade education. But she worked so hard and got so fluent in her beliefs and her messaging and her fearlessness that she cut through every time. And when we're talking about these seniors from earlier who are struggling to read, and now we're also talking about this woman who only had a sixth-grade education and what she was able to do, it's just marrying both of these concepts. About one, how we need to make sure that our young people are getting the education that they need and that they deserve. But two, regardless of where you are, regardless of the education you got, regardless if it's a PhD or sixth grade education, you can add value to these struggles. You can add value to this work. You still have purpose and you still have value. And you have to value yourself. So she had a very powerful voice and she had a very powerful acumen for organizing. It can be built. She takes away excuses. And that's what we should take from that. Is that she cares so much about this? She learned in her 40s, in her 40s, that she could vote and have her voice heard. You understand that? Like what kind of mind trip that must put somebody on? See, I want to bridge. Between our future and the current generation to our past, and really understand when people say we're standing on the shoulders of giants, this is what they're talking about. They're talking about somebody who did more than cry on a non-existent camera that did not exist at the time that she was doing it, but she went out and did. She built, she physically. Did hard work and labor. She took ass whoopings for us as a people. It is I know that there are so many people right now that are fighting for justice and fighting for freedoms and what in ways that they see fit. And some of them are doing an amazing job in the social media space and digital ⁓ organizing. And I get it. I'm not trying to shit on that. I'm I'm not. I'm not. There's a lane for it. But there's also different types of work that people can do and that people have done so you can have that right to do that. And we got to honor that. And I think the way that we honor it is by going outside, talking to actual people, actually organizing, not letting your shortcomings shame you or stop you, but using it as the motivating force and fuel for you to go and become this version of Fannie Lou Hamer. And maybe you are really, really good with the words and super smart. So maybe you become this generation's James Baldwin. These people gave us marching orders. It wasn't to just replicate what they were doing or be them. What I think they would say, and I say this humbly and respectfully, because I don't know what they would say, but I'm just going off what they've written and what I've heard them say. They would expect us to build on top of what they've already built for us. You see what I'm saying? Like, so in this world right now where everybody's trying to be perfect and everybody's trying to build the perfect social media persona and say the right things or say the wrong things or hey, I care about black liberation, I want to do this or whatever. ⁓ no, wait, I'm a proud boy. So let me say the most wild racist shit because all this is to get clicks. Life is not being reserved for the living at this point. And I wanted to cover Fanny Lou Hamer because when I did the piece, the episode on Sarah Carpenter a while back, I got a few people that were honest and saying, I don't know very much about Fanny Lou Hamer. And what I said was pull out that magical device that's in your pocket. That if you had this 40 years ago, people would look at you like you were a sorcerer that had access to all the knowledge in the world. And do a deep dive. You can actually do that. You can go and watch these people. You can read what they wrote. You can have it read to you. But it was just important for me to bring in a real breathing soul, somebody that walked this earth that did not have a lot of money, did not have a lot of education, but was so. magnanimous, so revolutionary just in her life, because she had to be st in order to partake in something that so many of us take for granted, which is the right to vote. And I'm not saying that voting is the end-all be all, but it's at the cornerstone of a democracy. The idea that this idea of a country was built on. And when we refuse to engage with the literacy rates, when we care more about celebrity gossip, when we care more about scamming, when we care more about looking good online and not utilizing all these wonderful, incredible, and amazing tools and pairing that with people like Fannie Lou or Frederick Douglass or any of these people. In some ways, we are ostensibly failing those legacies. Now, I'm not trying to say everybody gotta be a revolutionary. I'm not. I'm really not. I'm really not. Like, listen, I grew up homeless. I understand the importance of being able to pay bills, not be homeless, put some milk food on the table, take care of your kids, all that. I get it. I get it. But sometimes you gotta be reminded of what got put on the line for you. Especially people that look like you. Now, I'm a black man, like I said, just in case people didn't know. I don't know if you're listening. And maybe you just one of the people that swear up and down, you don't see color. And you just, I don't know what you thought I was. I don't know. Maybe you thought my name was Carlos instead of Charles. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. But I'm a black man that has a lot of love for a lot of different people. But I do focus on my people. You might be Irish. There are stories of Incredible people that were Irish that worked hard to build for their families and come to this country and do X, Y, and Z. And there's an extensive history of how they were treated here, but what they had to do before they came, but before they could become white and all that stuff. Maybe you're Italian, maybe you're from Zimbabwe, maybe from Jamaica. I don't know. But my point is that even though my messaging may be hyper focused and concentrated to what I know and what I come up from and what I personally love. It still has a universal theme. And the universal theme is this. There was a time in this country where most people could not read, and it was seen as a luxury. And then there was a time when this country got very, very, very literate. And now, right now, we are digressing. And it's something that's important. What I want you to take from this is there's a lot of adults right now that struggle with their own literacy in reading. And guess what? It's nothing for you to be ashamed of. This is not about shaming. I have a bunch of degrees. Doctor is really in front of my name. And you know what? I have to read things three and four times sometimes. I'm gonna be very honest with you. This just happened to work out, Tommy. And you don't need to co sign this because you were there. When Tommy came in and asked me if I was ready to record, I was Going back through my script that I wrote, like for the fourth time, just to make sure that I was being clear, being clear on the parts that I wanted to make sure I didn't mess up, so I read that part versus where I riffed, like I still take a long time to read things. I'm somebody that reads books, but I also use audiobooks. Sometimes I have both going at the same time. I try to frequent bookstores when I can. If you got a local bookstore, great, go do it. Maybe you don't, maybe there's just a Barnes and Noble. Great. Go in there too. I know there's a war between, you know, should you go into Barnes and Nobles first your local? If you can frequent your local spot, go to it. Sometimes local ain't got it. I don't know. That's not my that's not the issue. We can do that in a different episode. What I'm saying is that you have, we have, I have. So many more tools that my ⁓ just in front of me that I have access to, that many of which don't cost any money, or you already got it, you've already baked in the costs in your everyday living. So not being informed now is a choice. It's a choice. And I say this as somebody who likes a lot of dumb shit, who consumes a lot of popular media. I just watched the first episode of Lanterns. Shit is incredible. It's not gonna do anything for my life, but it's really good TV. There's a new different world coming out. I'm really scared about this new different world, this iteration. I think that the original was perfect. ⁓ I know it's gonna get the 2026 treatment, but I'm gonna watch it. Again, doesn't do anything or change anything for my life or people coming after me. So you get to enjoy what you enjoy. I'm not saying don't enjoy your life. What I'm saying is that we can make some choices. And if there's young people that you work with at a school and you're frustrated that they can't read, then you should be thinking about how do I up my game to make sure that we change this and help them catch up? And what can I provide their parents or the people in their community to help them while I'm working? If you're mad at the scammer or you're mad at the guy and you think he's a scammer again, brother, I don't know you. I don't know if you're a scammer. I don't want to put that on your jacket, because I don't know you. But if you're more mad at him. For doing the 2026 version of selling dope in the streets, because that's how people eat. And they they I'm not absolving it. Just grew up in the 80s and 90s. A lot of motherfuckers sold dope. Social media and pandering and fucking and and clout chasing. I hate that term. That's the new dope. It's the new selling dope. In 20 years, rappers will be talking about trapping out the mud on TikTok. It's just what it is. But if you're more upset about that than the actual problem that's plaguing our people and holding us back in very many ways, then I would just say examine that. I'm not even judging you because you can be annoyed by that, because I'm annoyed by it on some level. Do a whole I got a company that's built on agency. So you got agency the same way I got agency. The same way I got to choose the topic that I did today. The same way that I dug up the spirit and the fight and the climb of one Miss Fanny Lou Hamer who went through the unimaginable and made shit better for all of us. That was a choice. And this isn't the stuff that's gonna get 10 million views. And honestly, I wouldn't want it. I wouldn't know what to do with that type of attention. I don't know. But somebody's gonna get this message. And if you like it, share it. Chop it up or comment on it. And if you don't like it, again, I welcome debate. I welcome healthy debate. I'm not, I'm not into social media games. I don't want beef. I don't want those things. But if if if somebody has a different view on this and we want to have a conversation that people can learn from and grow from, and we can reach common ground, and maybe I'll learn something and maybe you learn something, then let's do it because we have the means and the tools to do that. We are the people that we have been waiting for. We keep we don't have to keep talking about the future. The future is now. We are in it. There are fucking conversations about the singularity of AI. That's where we are now. That was a Terminator movie when I was younger. And that was here. So we got some choices to make. I've missed you all. I was away. I was out the country for a week. I was not able to do a show. That's my bad. I hope you missed me as well. But what I do need you all to do is to keep supporting the show. ⁓ I try to answer all the emails and keep sending them. And I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for continuing to listen to Color Commentary. And I would really love to hear from you. So drop me an email at colorcommentarypod at gmail.com. That's color commentary pod at gmail.com. And if you like what you hear, please subscribe to the show, leave us a five-star review, share it on social media, and join us every Thursday for more Color Commentary with Dr. Cole. Peace.