Mercifully, someone won the Powerball lottery on Wednesday night – a mystery man or woman in Chino Hills, California, a town I’ve probably driven through on the way to Palm Springs and didn’t even notice. The jackpot hit a staggering $1.6bn before it was finally claimed. That astronomical figure worked up normally sane individuals into a frothy mixture of avarice and maniacal delusion. Lines of miserable, desperate Americans formed outside of liquor stores, and it wasn’t even Christmas. Congratulations are in order for the newly minted billionaire, as the odds of winning the prize money stood at 1-in-292.2m, meaning you had a better chance of waking up one day as Ted Cruz, winning the Republican nomination for president, impregnating yourself like in the movie Junior, then giving birth to a clone of Ed Koch than walking away with that cash. Those odds are so grim, in fact, that I’d advise all of you to consider a much easier path to fame and fortune. You’re better off praying for some calamity to befall your neighborhood, especially if you’re black.

This week, the world fell madly in love with Michelle Dobyne, a Tulsa, Oklahoma, woman who became famous for an interview in front of an apartment building that had recently caught on fire, leaving the residents without power for a couple days. Not exactly the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in terms of newsworthiness or significance, but these sorts of stories are the bread and butter of the local news industry, especially in mid-sized towns such as Tulsa, where the pace of life is significantly more methodical.

What elevated this event to burgeoning internet legend is Dobyne, whose interview with Tulsa’s KOTV News went viral in a matter of days. According to the original report, the newsroom at KOTV “had [their] entire newsroom laughing”, which inspired them to put the video online. The original version of the interview, posted on Facebook, had more than 27m views at time of writing. I don’t even think one million people know I exist, let alone 27 million. I am an insignificant little speck of dust, a suspicious mole on the rear end of the universe. Dobyne, on the other hand, is now much more. She’s a meme.

I’ve watched the video many times in the hopes that I could understand what people found so appealing about her story. It’s clear that Dobyne plays up for the camera, relishing her opportunity to leave an impression on the viewer. She makes eye contact throughout the interview, rarely breaking her stare or relaxing her face muscles. Her account of the day’s events are peppered with aspiring catchphrases-to-be: “It’s poppin’!” “Ah man, da buildin’ is on fire!” “I say what? She says yeah. I say nah!” What’s really poppin’ is her M&Ms branded jacket, which looks like something a Nascar driver would wear, which would make sense for her predicament, since I believe their uniforms are flame-retardant.

The video definitely doesn’t get funnier the more you watch it. It doesn’t even stay the same amount of funny. There’s not really much to it, besides the decibel level of her voice and the “ghettoness” of it all. If there was a dastardly TV show called Poor People Say the Darndest Things, (airing on TLC and hosted by Mario Lopez, naturally) this would probably be their centerpiece clip. It’s perilously close to Mantan Moreland territory, the kind of bug-eyed coonery that black comic actors were forced to play if they wanted to work. It almost feels racist, except that she’s not playing a character, as far as we know.

The apparatus that processes these viral stars for duty in the lowbrow entertainment trenches is fully operational and working at a remarkable rate. It only took two days for auto-tune masters the Gregory Brothers to “songify” Dobyne’s interview, which they also did with Antoine Dodson’s Bed Intruder (inspired by Dodson’s passionate interview about the attempted rape of his sister) and Charles Ramsey’s Dead Giveaway (the motormouthed dishwasher who helped rescue Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight from their 10 years of imprisonment by Ariel Castro). On their Facebook page, the Gregory Brothers state that “HUNDREDS of requests” (emphasis theirs) came in for them to record a song based off of Dobyne’s interview. The finished product, called Not Today (The Building’s on Fire) might not reach the infectious heights of Bed Intruder, but what could? Never before had a song that should have been a 15-second ringtone been so popular. It was the Mozart’s Requiem of songs about home invasions.

Next for Dobyne is an appearance on Maury and potentially a future in standup comedy. Surely, there will be offers coming in – personal appearances, voiceovers, cameos in films, etc. I say that with certainty because Dodson popped up in a Tyler Perry movie (A Madea Christmas) and Charles Ramsey released a memoir. With that comes money. Maybe not Powerball money, but much more than any of these people are used to. The Facebook page for the Gregory Brothers directs viewers to donate to Dobyne’s GoFundMe page. The site states that Dobyne actually lives in her car and can’t afford things like clothes and shoes for her three children. This is no shock to me because African Americans are currently the demographic group with the largest percentage of its population suffering from unemployment. When viral moments happen for people such as Dobyne, Ramsey and Dodson, they might as well have won the lottery for what it does to their lives. It’s transformative, even if the videos themselves make you cringe a bit when you think about them too much.

People like these interviews because they trade on stereotypes. It’s the same reason audiences come back to Perry’s Madea movies. It’s not explicitly demeaning, but it does feel heavier when considering the context of the society it was birthed out of. Dobyne’s bug-eyed incredulousness wouldn’t bother me if it didn’t remind me of Mantan. The story of hundreds of people donating money to help her with her family would be a lot more heartwarming if there weren’t millions of other moms dealing with the same dilemma who haven’t gotten the chance to shuck and jive for the local news. How much of the laughter is with her rather than at her? It’s part of the dilemma that pushed Dave Chappelle to end his Comedy Central show at the height of its popularity. He couldn’t answer that question to his satisfaction any more than I can answer that question about Dobyne.

Now, I happen to be a career misanthrope, which means I’m probably missing the positive aspect of Dobyne’s story. It must give hope to those in a similar predicament that they too can be discovered. It’s possible that Dobyne saw Ramsey and Dodson and knew enough to be prepared for her moment to shine. I can’t in good consciousness dissuade anyone from hoping to replicate those success stories anymore than I would begrudge Mantan Moreland or Perry their right to earn a living pulling faces. Even if the television appearances and the attention go away, where these people end up is usually much better than where they started. Ramsey is attempting to make a go at a career as a motivational speaker now that the cameras are gone. Dodson might be spending his free time getting punched in the face and has decided he is “not gay anymore,” but he did make enough money to buy his family a nicer house in a safer neighborhood thanks to Bed Intruder.

That hope can also be cruel though. Bed Intruder and Dead Giveaway are not easily replicable. As a matter of fact, it’s much harder to make people laugh about kidnapping and torture than you’d imagine. In that sense, this phenomenon isn’t all that dissimilar from the Powerball, because in both instances, those who expect to reap the windfall of good fortune are sorely mistaken. People on the margins of society just like Dobyne spend money they don’t have in the vain hope of making that money back, plus a whole lot more. Lottery players are essentially buying dreams they might not otherwise have. At least Dobyne’s version of the New American Dream doesn’t cost anything. Well, other than a piece of her dignity.