The Thabiti Two Step - Give Me That Money

The Thabiti Two Step and the Logic of Reparations

Oh boy, this one was a doozy. Do you know what the two step is? It's a dance, it's a dance, and there's a lot of different varieties of it, but it's called the two step. Well, this thread, oh boy, this thread has brought to light a whole new dance move.

It's called the Thabiti two step. I'm going to read it all, but I'm just going to show you how this works. This is fascinating. This is a fascinating way to think through things. I got to be honest with you, and I feel like, I really do feel like this could work for a lot of different issues, and this is very useful, I think.

Let's see if we can apply this here. He goes, this is a thread about reparations. People were sending this to me this week, and it was like, well, man, I can't believe it. Thabiti came out for reparations, and I'm like, where have you been?

Thabiti's been into reparations for a long time, and maybe you had to read between the lines a little bit, but this is not surprising. I'm going to go through each of these tweets, and we're going to talk about them, but let's look at how this works.

This is fascinating. I really like this. I'm going to start to use this in my own life. I think this could be very helpful. Here's the Thabiti two step. It's not quite as funky as this, the Thabiti two step.

Here's what he says. He's talking about reparations, and he's talking about the response that people have to reparations. Here's his two step. Ready? Here we go. Thabiti says, there are so many excuses tossed about and rejections, even before an actual idea is offered, that there appear to be strongholds at work.

Strongholds. That's a nice biblical word. I like that word. I like that word. That's a good choice of word, too. There appears to be strongholds and principalities at work. Yeah, he's probably right about that.

Then he says, perhaps the strategy should be to go back to some basic questions. Now, here's the Thabiti two step. Ready? These are the two questions you need to ask yourself when you're thinking through the issue of reparations.

Ready? Ready? Number one, was a wrong committed? That's a good one. That's a good question, because I think that you've got to really ask yourself, was a wrong committed? First and foremost, before we can talk about reparations or restitution or anything like that.

That's true. I think he's right about that. Here's the second question. Ready? This is the Thabiti two step. In a two step, you've got to have two questions. Ready? Two moves. Two steps. Here's the second step.

Is it right to right the wrong? I don't like how that is. Is it right to right? That sounds weird. I'm going to change it. I'm going to say, is it good to right the wrong? Is it morally good to right the wrong?

I like that better. This is not my two step. This is not the AD two step. This is the Thabiti two step. We'll just read it as it is. Ready? Here's the Thabiti two step. Ready? Was a wrong committed? Is it right to right the wrong?

That's all it takes. Problem solved. Reparations for all. That's it, really? Really? Let's take it out of the context of the very emotionally charged reparations conversation. Let's use the Thabiti two step a little bit.

Let's practice our steps a little bit. Let's do it. All right. Ready? Here's my claim. My claim is that you stole my laptop. That's my claim. Let's just say, let's just pretend that somebody stole my laptop.

You stole my laptop. That's the problem. That was a wrong. Was a wrong committed? Yes. Okay. So the first part of the two step, somebody stole my laptop. You might not think that's wrong if you don't like me, but I think it's wrong.

It's biblically wrong. Right? All right. So that's the first part of the Thabiti two step. Now I say in order to make up for you stealing my laptop, you have to give me your car. And as long as, as long as the car is, uh, is, is 2016 or newer.

So you stole my laptop. So now you have to give me your car, but, and, and you might say, well, that's crazy. That's crazy. Adam. Come on, man. Car's worth much more than a laptop. And I'm like, yeah, but this is the Thabiti two step.

So look, was a wrong committed? Yes. You stole my laptop. Is it right to write the wrong? Yes. You have to write that wrong. So give me your car. Is that how this works? I got to go to, I got to go. I'm ready.

Let's see somebody. Hmm. Let's see. I think a good one here. Let's see somebody. Let's say somebody punched me in the face. Right? Somebody punched me in the face. Was that a wrong? Let's do the Thabiti two step.

Somebody punched me in the face. That's a wrong. Number one. Is it right to write that wrong? Yes, it is. So I'm going to cut your arm off. There you go. How do you like that? I mean, it's the Thabiti two step, right?

I mean, there's so many excuses and rejections even before an idea is offered. So that's a stronghold that works. All you got to do is ask yourself two questions. Was there a wrong committed? Is it right to write the wrong?

Yeah. So therefore, give me your arm. I'm going to cut it off before punching me in the face. Thabiti two step. You know, you can use that. You could just change the Thabiti two step a little bit and you could support other things.

Like I'll give you a new two step, right? This is inspired by the Thabiti two step. This is not the Thabiti two step, but it's inspired by the Thabiti two step. Ready? Here we go. Question one. Is love good?

Yes. Love is good. That's very true. Love is good. Is it right to spread a good thing? It's right to spread a good thing. I completely agree with that. Ready? Therefore, I can have 20 wives. Boom. Boom.

Drop that Thabiti two step. Actually, that was three. Yeah, so the Thabiti two step, I'm not so sure about it. It doesn't seem to work in any other circumstance. So what do you think the chance is that it works in this circumstance?

I would say probably very low. The Thabiti two step. Now, you might say, hey, Adam, that's not quite fair. You're taking this out of context. That's true. I am. That's very true. I am. But this is the thing.

These two questions are not really the right questions to ask in this conversation. I'm trying to demonstrate that because if you do take it out of context, it doesn't work. And so it actually doesn't work here either unless you start filling this with meaning.

Right? So you have to fill it with meaning. And the problem is that what he wants you to do is fill it with all kinds of meaning that he has in his mind that he has not proven. Right? So this is the problem.

Not only do you have to agree that a wrong was committed, yes, that's true, but you also have to agree that a wrong continues to be committed and that it's right to right that wrong in the way that he says it is, namely reparations.

Now, he's trying to weasel. He's very good. He's trying to weasel out of that by saying, look, no specific idea has been offered. Like A .D., you are offering specific ideas. Like they had to give you the car.

They had to give you your hand. You get to have 20 wives. Those are specific ideas that we can reject. But nobody's given a specific idea here, so you can't reject it. And that's baloney. Okay? Because reparations in our cultural context means something.

He tries to act like it doesn't mean anything, like it's just the idea that we need to talk about. No, you can reject it without hearing the specific proposal. Okay? You can reject it because you know what it means in this context.

Here, it's real easy. Ready? I'll tell you what it means. Ready? Reparations in general, when people use that word, what they mean is that people who have ancestors who were slaves should get money compensation from the government to make up for the fact that they had money taken from their ancestors.

That wasn't that hard, was it? The only reason that you would use reparations in another way is if you're trying to be sneaky. Or you're ignorant. And I don't think they'd be this ignorant. But here's the other thing, too.

It's not just the two-step. Ready? It's not just the two-step. He actually has a third one. A couple tweets later, he talks about a third one. Ready? And if we cannot bear to entertain a third basic question, and here's the question.

Ready? What does God in his word require of me to right the wrong? Then, as I said, I'm sad for those Christians. These are the ABCs of moral reasoning. Nothing fancy, but it is costly to follow Jesus.

That's cross-carrying. All these words are loaded with all kinds of arguments that he's not making, but he wants you to kind of go with him there and just believe them. But this actually is a good question.

What does God require of me to right the wrong? That's a very good question. I think that is a good question to ask. The problem is, once you get specific and you actually do look at the Bible and study it, then it's nothing like reparations, yo.

Nothing like it. And this ain't it. This ain't it, buddy. That's the BD2 step. Let's read this. Let's read this thread. This is a good thread. All right. All right. Here we go. Look. That's the BD2 step.

All right. Here's what he says. Let's just kind of go through this and respond to it as it is. Ready? He says, I'm sad for folks who hear the word reparations without any specific proposal attached who start exclaiming, blacks just want to steal white's money.

Wow. Oh, man. Talk about tilting at windmills. Have you ever talked to anyone about reparations and someone said that to you? I mean, let's just be honest. Like what reparations are, you know, people getting money from the government that would be stealing.

That's true. It would be stealing. But just to put it this way, it just makes it sound so dumb. Blacks just want to steal white's money. It's a retort that reveals possible idolization of mammon and willful blindness to 250 years of stealing black people themselves.

Wow. That sounds really bad. The way he says it, it makes it sound so bad. He's very good at rhetoric. I'll give him that. I'll give him that. His emotional manipulation is top notch. Top notch. But this is funny because what we've come to is a place that so, my goodness gracious.

I want you to just take a step back. Let's think about this for a second. Ready? So, there's a group of people that wants money. Right? They want compensation for a sin or a crime that happened to their great-grandparents or their great-great-grandparents or generations back.

Right? So, there's a group of people who want money for something that didn't happen to them. They want restitution for a crime that didn't happen to them but happened to somebody else a few generations down the line.

Right? So, there's the group of people who wants money for something else that happened. Not to them but to somebody else. And that's not the group that worships mammon. Mammon is money. That's not the group.

The one who wants the money is not the one that worships mammon. It's the one who doesn't want their money taken. Can you imagine? Can you imagine if someone came to my house and took $20 from my wallet?

And then I was like, hey man, give me my 20 bucks back. He's like, dude, what do you worship, money? This is gold, man. This is absolute gold. This is quite, I mean, to say something like this, it takes some serious audacity.

I mean, you need to be really, really an interesting person. Let's just put it that way. I want money but you're the one who worships mammon. Hey, AD, you don't want your income taken to be given to ancestors of slaves.

So, you're the one who worships money. Okay. Sure thing, Fabiti. It's at the BD2 step. He goes on. He says, the hypocrisy of some self-professed conservatives who argue all day long that a person should be able to control their labor, but who do not think any recompense is owned for centuries of stolen labor is mind-blowing.

It's a glaring inconsistency. My goodness gracious. All right. It's real easy. This is actually real easy. I know that sometimes I say that when somebody gives you an easy solution, usually it's wrong.

But this is actually very easy because I think that if you talk to a hundred conservatives, white people, black people, brown people, whatever, whatever their skin color is, but they're conservative, you know, really conservative.

And you said to them, okay, if someone's enslaved, so taken, you know, man-stealing, kidnapped, and forced to work for the person for no money, should they get some compensation for that when the perpetrator's caught?

I bet you. I mean, you got your odd person in every group, right? I bet you 99 out of the hundred would say, yeah, they do. They should get some compensation for that. But you notice how the BD, he's sneaky.

He's switching it here because I don't know any, I mean, I'm sure there are some, but most of the people who are calling for reparations today, they weren't enslaved. They go to work. They're gainfully employed.

You know what I mean? They get compensated for what they do fairly. You know, they've agreed to their salary, their hourly rate or whatever. So, I'm sorry. I'm trying not to laugh, but the BD two-step is pretty preposterous.

So, he's already talking about something that's really not at stake at play here. Because look, I think every, I would agree. I'll just speak for myself. I would agree that if somebody is stolen from today, they deserve compensation for that.

They deserve restitution for that. So, if somebody stole my laptop, I should get restitution for that. That's a good, just, holy thing. That's what the Bible commands. I should get restitution for my stolen laptop.

Okay. But let's just keep it on the laptop for a second. If somebody stole my dad's laptop, that person's kid shouldn't have to pay me. You know what I'm saying? The person's kid didn't do anything to me.

Or my dad even. He says, then there are those who rush to tell us that reparations won't bring reconciliation and will only further the divide. What omniscience? What? He says, and as if the bearing of our heads, refusing to acknowledge wrongdoing and gospel escapism in the church has been practicing is, that the church has been practicing is healing the divide.

Wow. This is just the audacity of this. Wow. Reparations won't bring reconciliation, will only further the divide. You don't have to be omniscient to know that. Okay. You don't have to be omniscient to know that.

What omniscience? Yeah, you don't need omniscience. Because when you take money from someone who didn't do something wrong and then say that this is going to repair what somebody else did wrong, unless, oh my goodness.

There's so many ways to go about this. But that person who didn't do anything wrong that you took from, that person's now been wronged. And so it can't reconcile people because now that person needs restitution.

And if you continue to just take from others that did nothing wrong and give to others, that's a never-ending process. It's a never-ending process. And so, of course, it won't lead to reconciliation because all you're doing is creating new victims.

You can't solve something. You can't fix someone who's been a victim by creating new victims. It doesn't work that way. That's why the American system of justice doesn't really work that well either. Because when you jail someone instead of making them pay restitution, then now the person who was stolen from is a double victim because they're paying for that person's room and board and their jail cell and all that kind of stuff.

So they've been victimized again. And then they continue to be victimized because you never make restitution. Real restitution where people who have actually done something wrong and they're having to make restitution, that does lead to reconciliation.

But making new victims doesn't do that. You don't have to be omniscient. Why Thabiti thinks you need to be omniscient to know that, I'm not really sure. And then he says, as if the bearing of our heads refusing to acknowledge wrongdoing, that's healing the divide.

So there's only two options in his mind. It's the Thabiti two-step. It's either give me money or you're ignoring the issue. That's how his mind works. This is very black and white for him. Newsflash, those are not the only two options.

Those are not the only two options. We can actually have real forgiveness in our lives now because we've been forgiven from so much because Christ forgave our sin by taking it upon himself. And so now we don't have to hold things over people's heads, right?

At least that's what I thought the Christian message was all about. He goes on. He says, oh, this is the two-step. So we already talked about the two-step. He says, those are admittedly basic questions, but it seems to be where few Christians are stuck.

If a Christian cannot answer an unequivocal yes to those questions, then far more than debate about reparations is going on, more serious soul work is needed. So your soul, if you don't believe in reparations, your soul really needs some work.

Thabiti thinks your soul really needs some work. And who are these people? Who are these people that think in slavery that there was no wrong committed? I'd like to see one. I mean, there were certainly...

I mean, look, he's wanting no nuance. He's wanting no equivocations. But you have to have equivocations because the Bible talks about regulating slavery and making sure that you're doing slavery in a righteous way.

And so you have to kind of equivocate because not all slavery is unrighteous, right? Sometimes it can be righteous. Now, I'm not saying that American slavery was that way because there's a lot of man-stealing involved.

But when you steal someone, that's a violation of the law of God. It's a non-starter, right? You can't start that way. Anyway, so he wants an unequivocal yes. Okay, is a wrong committed? Yes. Is it right to right the wrong?

Yes. But you can't answer... That can't be an unequivocal thing. It can't be. Because in my Thabiti two-step example, love is a good thing. It's good to spread love. So I get 20 wives. You're like, well, no, no, no, no, no.

You can't do that because that's not really love. See, all of a sudden, we're equivocating here. And so we have to be nuanced. We have to be specific about what we're talking about. You can't just say, was a wrong committed?

Is it right to commit a wrong? Therefore, give me money. No, there has to be equivocation. So this idea that we can do this just so, yes, it's right to right a wrong. Okay, then give me your hand. Once you say no to that, now we have to have a conversation, right?

Okay. He goes, in the final analysis, I want something much more profound than the country's money. Yeah, but you want the money too. It sounds so high-minded. I want something much more profound than the country's money, but give me that money too.

I want its moral and spiritual rectitude. I want Christians to follow the way more, follow the way more fully with a glad heart. I want your freedom from guilt both historical and where applicable, personal.

Both historical and where applicable, personal. So yeah, I like to be free from guilt too. And so what you do, there's a couple ways you can be free from guilt. Don't do anything wrong, number one, you could do that.

Or when you do do something wrong, because none of us are perfect, right? None of us are guilt-free except for Christ, right? So when you do do something wrong, you follow the steps of reconciliation in the scripture, right?

You follow what restitution is required in the scripture. A lot of people like to cite Zacchaeus, right? Zacchaeus, he actually did steal from people and so he gave back and then some. That's what God's law requires.

That was restitution. So he reconciled with the people he stole from by giving them their money back plus a factor of whatever it was given the situation. So that's the thing. That's how you make restitution.

But it wasn't that he was giving money because his daddy stole something. No, he had stolen. He was in the wrong. He needed to reconcile. And so the Bible gives us example after example of this, right?

And so he's saying that you have to be free from not only your personal guilt but also historical guilt. Right? And so you are guilty for the sins of your father and you need to pay up for the sins of your father even though the law of God explicitly numerous times says that you're actually not responsible for the sins of your father.

Every person's responsible for their own sins. Now, is there such a thing as societal sin? Yes, of course there's such a thing as societal sin. Right? And God can judge societies based on societal sin.

That's very true. God can do that. But the civil government can't. So in other words, I couldn't be judged because I couldn't be judged for killing babies because the government kills babies. Right? I mean, that's just not how it works.

Now, God can decide to judge the United States over killing babies and that's fine. That's God's prerogative. So this idea that he wants me to be free from guilt both historical and where applicable personally.

Okay. But if we're going to play this game of blacks versus whites and blacks are victims and whites are oppressors and guilty then you have to keep going with that game. You can never stop that game.

It's a game that never ends because blacks also were the ones doing some of the man stealing. So blacks, I guess, now are oppressors and other blacks are victims and so do you want to go back into the different tribes and try to figure out who owes what to them and this and that and make reparations for them too?

No, of course you don't want to do that but you just want to stop here but you can't stop here. That's not how it works. So this whole thing is about money. He wants money. He wants something deeper than money though but he wants your money too.

He can't forgive you unless you give him the money. I mean, come on, man. The stronghold says you can't have these things or the cost is too high or the task too difficult or it's unfair. Oh, the Thabiti two-step, I can feel it.

Can you feel it? I can feel it. The Thabiti two-step is all over this. The stronghold says you can't have these things or the cost is too high or the task is too difficult or it's unfair but where does that reasoning come from when the topic is pursuing righteousness?

Hint, it doesn't come from God or his word. It's the world. Listen, dude. If you don't believe in slavery reparations then you're of your father the devil. That's where it comes from. It's unfair? It's unjust?

That's what you're saying? It's unjust for the son to pay for the sins of the father? That's unjust? Sounds like Satan to me. Do you hear this? This is preposterous. I mean, I'm laughing about this. You know what I mean?

The Thabiti two-step. But this is really evil because the word of God says that the sons aren't responsible for the sins of the father nor is the father responsible for the sins of the son but every person dies for their own sin.

We're talking about the civil here. Civil realm. You can't say, your father was a Russian spy therefore I'm going to kill your whole household. God can do that kind of thing. God can judge, He can judge a tribe or He can judge a nation as a collective.

God can do that but as a civil, person to person, we can't do that. But if you say that that's unfair and unjust according to Scripture, well, that's the world or the flesh or even Satan. This is pretty evil, man.

I mean, Thabiti, Yadim, Willy, this is pretty evil stuff that you're saying here. Lastly, He says, I would have you walk in victory over the enemies Christ has defeated. I would have you walk in that faith which is our victory.

I would have you walk in the obedience that comes from faith but I would not coddle you. Following Jesus is costly. It'll cost more than your money but give me that money too, you know what I'm saying?

Oh, man. The Thabiti two-step. See, it doesn't work. The Thabiti two-step doesn't work because I think He thinks He's made some kind of an argument here. Some kind of a compelling case for slavery reparations.

He hasn't. He hasn't. This is not compelling at all. You might use this language, oh, you got to walk in faith. It's going to cost you. It's going to be costly. More than money but the money too. It sounds so high-minded and spiritual and all of these things but really when you get down to it, He's overturning the law of God here and calling it good and saying that if you want to hold on to the law of God then you're of Satan.

This is evil. This is evil stuff. I would actually have you walk over the enemies that Christ has defeated. For example, bitterness. You got to let go of that bitterness. You got to be like the forgiving servant not the unforgiving servant.

You realize you have been forgiven of everything. This huge debt that you had and then you turn around and hold this tiny debt over some people that aren't even responsible for it. It's not even like the unforgiving servant had a real person in front of him that really did owe him money.

At least he could say, Look, this guy is robbing me. He was still in the wrong. He wasn't forgiving this person even as the person asked and begged for mercy as he just got mercy. He was still in the wrong but at least you could see this is a real perpetrator and a real victim.

But what the beast is asking for is give me your money even though you never enslaved me even though you never enslaved my father even though you never enslaved my grandfather. No, no, no. It was your great-great-grandfather that enslaved my great-great-grandfather maybe and so give me your money.

Man, this is brutal. This is bad. Can't you see how poisonous this is? It's poison. If you go with this what won't you go for? What won't you go for? Not to mention the fact that this is going to make double victims out of so many people including me because for example I've talked about this before my ancestors were slaves.

My ancestors were man-stolen and brought over in the slave trade. Guess what? I'm going to be paying for this too. So the money that's going to go to Thabiti or whoever in this transaction I made a double victim because I was victimized according to his own nonsense I was victimized and now I'm paying for others' victimization too.

That's unjust. It's unfair. It's a matter of biblical justice and it's evil. And so Christians should be promoting justice. And so I promote justice in this case. But apparently this comes from Satan.

Sure. I call on anyone that wants to push for reparations. I call on anyone to have a conversation with basically anyone on my side about this and prove it from the scriptures that reparations are just the way that they're talked about now.

This is how he slips out of me. I'm not giving up a proposal but you are though because you're using the words. If I say welfare, everybody knows what I'm talking about even if I don't have a specific proposal in mind.

When I say same-sex marriage, everybody knows what I'm talking about even when I don't have a specific proposal in mind. This whole idea is that you can't reject until you know what it is. No, we can.

Because unless you're talking about someone who's been enslaved today by someone who's alive today then we can reject it. Anyway, hope you enjoyed the Thabiti 2-step. More to come on reparations this week.

Reparations Week and White Guilt

This is reparations week. By the way, if you are feeling guilty Let me just say You don't owe me anything because that wouldn't be biblical. But if you are feeling that white guilt that wonderful, wonderful white guilt I'm a non-white.

You can give to me. It's not going to atone for anything. It's not going to actually do anything but it will go a long way in increasing the quality of these videos and the frequency of these videos and it'll show you what kind of content you like.

I'll continue to make it. Anyway, I hope this was helpful. God bless.