A MAN AND A
MISSION THAT
HAS NEVER
GROWN OLD
TAGS:
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR, CIVIL RIGHTS STRUGGLES 1960’S,
PRESIDENT
LYNDON B. JOHNSON, CIVIL RIGHTS ACT, VOTER’S RIGHTS ACT,
INSTITUTIONAL
SEGREGATION, DISCRIMINATION, JIM CROW,
DIXIE
HIGHWAY, MLK TAKEN FAR TOO SOON
(Monday January 19, 2015
Memphis, TN) It is easy to lose sight of
just how young Martin Luther King Jr was when an assassin's bullet took his life
here on April 4, 1968. Reverend Doctor
King was only 39 years old yet despite his young age he became a unifying force
for a cause; a cause he’d made his life’s work and ultimately cost him his
life. He sought racial justice in a
country that 100 years after the Civil War still permitted if not codified
segregation, discrimination, bias and animus towards Black Americans – Negros
as they were referred to as in Dr. King’s day – in the face of some of the
staunchest resistance to change. Parts
of our country were not only practicing the harsh rules of Jim Crow but were
simply treating Blacks largely the same as they did when slavery was still
legal. The Deep South saw violent
clashes between those with vested interests in the status quo; between a Black
populace that was isolated and made to feel inferior to the White
majority. The worst of segregation and
the reality of “two classes of people separate and unequal” in even the most
basic human and civil rights would die a slow death across the Deep South and
some border states. The mass migrations up the “Dixie Highway” to the large
northern industrial centers like Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, New
York, and a host of other cities in the north and west proved to Black
Americans there were formidable obstacles to be faced even outside of Dixie.
Reverend King’s legacy stands
for itself. He, with the help of
President Lyndon B. Johnson, brought the Voter’s Rights Act and other Civil
Rights legislation to fruition. Johnson,
a product of the Senate before being tapped to serve as President John Kennedy’s
Vice President, knew how to bluster, cajole, manipulate, twist arms and
intimidate others in the Senate to adopt his point of view and Johnson
sincerely sought to end discrimination and sought to have Black Americans assimilate into
the “main stream” of all our institutions and communities. He was a true believer despite the erroneous
history often spouted by the un - and mis- informed.
Here we stand now, all these
years later with an African American President more than halfway through his
second term. No one on either side of
the racial battles of the 1960’s and 1970’s ever even imagined they would see a
Black man as US President in their lifetimes.
But they have; perhaps a majority of Americans; certainly the broad
coalition that voted President Obama into Office twice, did so with the
belief that his ascendency would somehow be a milestone, a turning point, a
marker in the history of our country delineating our past and this new “Post
Racial America”. They could not have
been more wildly mistaken. If anything there has
been a resurgence of racism in parts of the country in part sparked by the
revelations that young Black and Latino men fear the Police and view them as an
“occupying force” of “brutal thugs”.
Several incidents of White Police Officers shooting unarmed young Black
men last year served to incite demonstrations and protests, some that turned
violent, as well as a “declared” open season on Cops. There have been Cops ambushed and
assassinated, some surviving, others succumbing to their wounds. These events have only added impetus to “the
cause” no matter which side you may be aligned with. It seems there is no middle ground in this
arena of debate, no ambivalence or shades of gray. Everything about what has been going on in
cities all across America is presented as a stark, unambiguous, day or night,
up or down, black or white divide. Given
the absence of any acceptable, neutral arbiter such as Dr. King was when the
KKK was burning crosses and lynching innocent Black men on trumped up charges,
it seems this divide will grow wider and deeper.
Dr. King was the champion of “nonviolent
civic action” as the only acceptable means towards achieving an end in the
struggle he saw before him. There was,
however, nothing actually “passive” in his philosophy; it was characterized by
strength, a strength so pure and deep that a believer could endure pain,
ridicule, beatings, false arrests, death threats and all manner of atrocities perpetrated by those opposed
to his cause employed, in an unflinching demonstration of stony resolve.
While the use of nonviolent
resistance further enraged his foes, after a time they had to look upon the Reverend
King and his followers with a begrudging nod towards respect (?)…or something
very close to it. By the time James Earl
Ray’s bullet took his life, Dr. King left behind him a strong ideological
following that made Americans everywhere regardless of station in life,
profession, race, color or creed take notice and begin to look inside
themselves. The madness of legalized
segregation and all its overt and subtle manifestations could no longer survive
unchallenged.
This is not to imply an
overnight transformation across the country.
The struggle for equality would continue for decades and, in many facets
of American society, culture, education, housing, employment and access,
continues to this very day. Mr. Obama
might be our President yet many predominately African American ghettos remain
as blights, not so much on our communities, but rather on our conscience. We should be able to do better for those most
in need and this is not a rallying cry from a bleeding heart liberal for more
public assistance, more welfare, more of anything of the kind. It is simply a statement of need. African Americans in some neighborhoods have
literally no chance of obtaining a living wage job. Many lack in even basic K through 12 educations
with some of the “failing” schools failing far more than their students; they
are failing all of society.
Those of us born in the years
up until the late 1950’s likely can remember some of the signs and symbols of
segregation and racism from our youth: the “Coloreds” section at the end of the lunch counter
at Woolworths, the “Sunset” neighborhoods and communities that would not
tolerate the presence of an African American in their midst after sunset. In relative terms those days and times were
not all that long ago. Much progress has
been made yet there is always room for more progress, more inclusion and
standards need not be lowered to accommodate such inclusiveness.
Prejudice no matter who it is
directed at or aimed to is a soul sickness.
Prejudice is not innate, it is learned.
Children do not come into the world prewired, already circuited with
inherent prejudice. Yes, humans have the
capacity for prejudice just as they do for all the other traits and characteristics
we see manifest in others. Prejudice,
just like bias, intolerance and racism is taught, it is something a child
learns not in nature but in nurture.
Like human cellular sponges our children draw from and acquire attitudes
and behaviors from their parents and siblings, from the environments they are
reared in. Often without realizing,
parents and older siblings, cousins, neighbors and friends introduce into a
young mind ideas and words, concepts and beliefs that those tender pliable
minds take in and hard-wire into their neural circuitry. Sadly, this results in too many children “inheriting”
the biases and prejudices of the elders around them.
One of human nature’s more
troubling traits is our need to divide and conquer; to divide our world between
“us” and “them”. Since our earliest days
living in hunter-gatherer settlements and likely farther back into antiquity,
we naturally seek alliances with those we are obviously most closely related to
and that need extends further out to those we see familiarity in. That is the very basis of, as theorized by
evolutionary biologists, are capacity for empathy; for our ability to sacrifice
for the greater good even when that larger good is not immediate family. Empathy, perhaps more than any other single
trait, separates us from our closest relatives on the genetic tree.
Biologically, there is no
difference between human beings of different colors, ethnicities, races or
creeds. Genetically, on the submicroscopic scale of
DNA, one would be hard pressed to identify any evidence that categorically proves
a difference of any kind between people with Black skin, Brown Skin, Red Skin,
Yellow Skin or White Skin. Modern
science has made this abundantly clear.
Our “differences” are of our own design, of a manufactured construct
that is just a few eons removed from the tribal and familial warfare that
determined if our species would survive or die.
We all occupy a very small intricately interconnected planet; the “pale
blue dot” as viewed by Neil Armstrong from the Lunar surface in 1969.
As global citizens we should
all and always be cognizant of our proximity, our shared humanity, and our “sameness”. As Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr
said just a year prior to his premature death, “Human progress is neither
automatic nor inevitable... Every step toward the goal of justice requires
sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate
concern of dedicated individuals”. As
Abraham Lincoln commented, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”, we
all must try to put the pettiness and animosity aside. We are all passengers on the same boat and we
will, no doubt, either sink to doom or swim to redemption together.
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Brooding Cynyx 2015 © All Rights Reserved
