Tyler Perry wasted no time tearing into Trump’s administration and the divisive state of America during the BET Awards Monday night.
After sharing a brief story about his son, the billionaire media mogul launched into an impassioned State of the Union-esque address to condemn what has been happening in the country as of late — specifically with the erasure of Black history.
“I want you to pay attention to— don’t miss this,” he began onstage. “They are removing our books from libraries. They are removing our stories and our history. They are removing our names from government buildings as if someone wants to erase our footprints.”
“Because what we need to understand is that if our children don’t know our history, they won’t know our power,” Perry added.
The filmmaker pointed his message to Black viewers, telling them, “The truth of the matter [is], it’s impossible to erase our footprints, because we left them on water. What I mean by that is, we were snatched from our homeland, bought across the ocean and left footprints all the way to America.”
Perry continued his history lesson, nodding to the sanitation of African American history in museums and calling out American tragedies like the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, where several businesses were famously burned down on Oklahoma’s Black Wall Street in an effort to destroy the thriving community.
“So, this is not the time to be silent,” Perry continued to the audience. “This is not the time to give up. This is the time to dig in and keep leaving footprints everywhere you go.”
He even took a moment to brag about how he’s “made more Black millionaires than any studio in this city combined.”
“Because I’m making footprints,” he added.
Perry concluded his powerful speech, saying, “So I don’t care if you’re struggling, if you’re trying to make it, if you’re trying to build a business. If you have a dream, keep making footprints. Don’t let anybody stop you. You can do it.”
Kevin Winter via Getty Images
Perry isn’t the only star who took hold of the BET Awards spotlight to deliver a politically charged message. Doechii, who won Best Female Hip-Hop Artist, used her acceptance speech to blast the “ruthless attacks” from Trump’s administration after it deployed military forces on Los Angeles protests over the weekend over immigration raids.
“Trump is using military forces to stop a protest,” she said. “And I want y’all to consider what kind of government it appears to be when every time we exercise our democratic rights to protest, the military is deployed against us.”
“I feel it’s my responsibility as an artist to use this moment to speak up for all oppressed people,” the rapper added. “For Black people, for Latino people, for trans people, for the people of Gaza, we all deserve to live in hope and not in fear, and I hope we stand together, my brothers and my sisters, against hate. And we protest against it.”
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