By: Donald V. Watkins
Copyrighted and Published on February 6, 2025
An Editorial Opinion
Since January 20, 2025, President Donald Trump, First Buddy Elon Musk, and their far-right minions in government have unleashed a Blitzkrieg of actions against every form of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) that benefits women and historically disadvantaged minorities in America.
Trump and Musk have even lashed out at South Africa over that nation’s land repatriation law without providing the American people with any historical context for these laws.
Recently, Trump appointed white supremacist Darren J. Beattie to a top job in the State Department. Beattie has openly said, “Competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work.” Beattie also urged black Republicans to “learn [their] place and take a knee to MAGA” in a 2021 Twitter post.
In a modern-day expansion of "Manifest Destiny," Trump announced that he wants 2.1 million Palestinians in Gaza to leave their ancestral homeland so that commercial real estate developers can turn this seaside community into a luxurious “Riviera” for the super-rich. Trump has even suggested that America should "own" Gaza during the redevelopment process.
Meanwhile, Elon Musk wants South Africa's 7.2% white population, which owns 72% of the nation's land, to retain this ownership even though the land in question was seized via deadly force and without compensation from South Africa’s indigenous black population during Britain's harsh colonial rule of the country from 1806 to 1992. Musk’s family enriched itself from these land seizures and enhanced its wealth by exploiting black South Africans during the country’s long period of brutally enforced racial apartheid.
Musk wallowed in state-sponsored white privilege in South Africa until he was 18 years old. Before South Africa gained its independence in 1992, Musk migrated to Canada in 1989. He migrated from Canada to America in 1995.
As expected, Trump, Musk, and their minions in government have not engaged in any Blitzkrieg actions against the blatant racial bigotry, engrained sexism, and widespread cronyism that operates to systematically exclude women and minorities from the socio-economic progress of America on a daily basis.
Less than two years ago, the ultra-conservative U.S. Supreme Court in Allen v. Milligan affirmed a lower federal court's ruling that the state of Alabama discriminates against its black citizens from the "cradle to the grave." During his first day on the job, Trump signed Executive Orders that will breathe new life into this "cradle to the grave" model of discrimination against blacks, women, and other historically disadvantaged minorities nationwide.
Surviving Blatant Racism, Sexism, and Cronyism
Regardless of the Trump-Musk team’s motives for declaring war on all DEI activities that benefit women and minorities in American, there are proven and practical pathways for surviving this Blitzkrieg. This article discusses the pathways that have worked for Watkins family members since America’s Civil War ended in 1865.
The Watkins family has always stressed educational excellence, brainpower, goal setting, focus, perseverance, patience, financial independence, and hard work to secure and protect our future in American society. These are the only tools that have consistently worked for us in the face of never-ending racism, sexism, and other impediments to our inclusion in the socio-economic progress of this nation.
We have always had to outthink, outwork, outperform, and outlast any competitor or adversary.
Watkins family members do not complain whenever we are cheated out of victories that rightfully belong to us, or whenever we are "railroaded" in contests by racially biased public officials. These situations occur quite often in life.
We use the cheating, railroading, racial discrimination, and sexism that has been perpetrated against us to sharpen our focus and fuel our passion for success in life.
Here are our Basic Rules for Surviving Racial Bigotry, Sexism, and Cronyism:
We are never ambiguous about who we are and what we stand for.
We are morally strong people who nuture well-defined, positive character traits within our family members.
We always stand up for what is right, even when we have to stand alone.
We never kowtow to bullies.
We fear no man or woman.
We worship God and not men or women who act like gods.
We treat everyone with respect and in a fair manner.
We believe it is better to be respected than to be liked.
We develop and adhere to a purpose-driven life.
We set personal and professional goals and work hard to achieve them, even under adverse conditions.
We develop extensive, close-knit, and impenetrable networks of family members and true friends who share our personal values, our world vision, and our personal and business goals.
We avoid negative, selfish, and small-minded people.
We never seek to lower anybody's performance standards. Instead, we strive to outperform whatever the announced standard is in any field we choose.
We live within our financial means.
We spend our money with people who support us and on things that create or generate wealth.
We educate and mentor young people and bring them into our family's networks.
We let our work speak for us.
We never seek validation from anyone outside of our family and we never allow others define who we are.
We are bridge-builders in a global society. The positive impact and accummulated goodwill from our bridge-building activities have lasted for generations.
We register every generation of family members to vote and we vote in every election.
In the new Trump-Musk political paradigm, no strong American political leader is likely to emerge in the near future to protect women, blacks, Palestinians, black South Africans, and other disfavored groups from the perils of Trumpism. These groups must do this for themselves.