Happy MLK Day!

[island911]

LOL, Dr no. I nominate you for most changed Pelican.

Originally Posted by Superman

It is true that we do not have the leadership in the equality movement today that we had in the early sixties. Certainly true.
...
AFter reviewing Dr. King's struggles and message, it will be difficult to view our current batch of presidential candidates with a straight face.

Not even Hillary?

[cool_chick]

Originally Posted by nostatic

ok, have at it. island can put his videos back in. And maybe snowman will chime in with a "coon" comment to put a cherry on top. I'm gonna go work on some music. have fun...

He just couldn't resist himself, could he? LOL. Now where's that cherry?

[Mule]

Originally Posted by K. Roman

I think we need a ban Mule day. I'm sick of his Stormfront views, but I'm sure he "calls 'em how I see 'em"

But, I don't think being racist/bigot qualifies.

Hey Dude, care to dispute facts rather than just call names?

[legion]

Originally Posted by Superman

I wonder who was surprised when MLK became a political pariah by championing other injustices. Anybody? Anybody think those other injustices were not important or related?

Like so many before and since, he expanded the scope of his vision once his initial goals were met. (For an extreme example, now the American Lung Association is trying to ban leaf burning now that they have gotten smoking banned everywhere.) I honestly don't see a damn thing that the Vietnam War had to do with civil rights.

(Anticipating some grossly convoluted explanations... )

[Mule]

Originally Posted by skipdup

And just what is a "white slut"?

Like a black slut but lighter complexion.

[cool_chick]

Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham's economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants -- for example, to remove the stores' humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained.

As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self-purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliation?" "are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our direct-action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economicwithdrawal program would be the by-product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.

Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoralty election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety, Eugene "Bill" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run-off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run-off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct-action program could be delayed no longer.

You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches, and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and halftruths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.

The purpose of our direct-action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I and my associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely. Some have asked: "Why didn't you give the new city administration time to act?" The only answer that I can give to this query is that the new Birmingham administration must be prodded about as much as the outgoing one, before it will act. We are sadly mistaken if we feel that the election of Albert Boutwell as mayor will bring the millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is a much more gentle person that Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to maintenance of the status quo. I have hoped that Mr. Boutwell will be reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral that individuals.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was "well timed" in view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."

[Mule]

Not one of the "Magnolia Ho's" in part 2 of this illustrious epic. Here it is folks, the fruits of the great society.

[cool_chick]

[cool_chick]

We have waited for more that 340 years for our constitutional and Godgiven rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking, "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored" when your first name becomes "Nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when your are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all."

[Mule]

Originally Posted by cool_chick

We have waited for more that 340 years for our constitutional and Godgiven rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.

Jet-like speed? Is that what you'd call the progress towards human rights currently being acheived in South Africa, Somalia, Rowanda, Zaire, Ethiopia, Chad, Namibia, Mozambique and others? THAT jet-like speed where slavery, torture, murder & dis-memberment are part of everyday life?

Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people;

However bad those mobs may have been, not many people alive today experienced any of that and the situation that exists today is so far removed from that as to bear no resemblance at all.

when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking, "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored" when your first name becomes "Nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when your are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments;

If you are going back this far, why not go further back to the times of slavery. Then you can conjure up even worse scenarios. Thank God though. Today the only place a black person will hear the "N" word is about 75 times in every rap song or 1000 times in any black oriented movie.

when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all."

And the net result of all of this is, it makes you want to change the greatest country in the history of mankind to a socialist state. I think I'm beginning to understand.

[cool_chick]

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of Harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus is it that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?

Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in it's application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First-Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.

I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience.

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. 'Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country's anti-religious laws.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another mans freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro the wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating that absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all it ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light injustice must be exposed with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion, before it can be cured.

[island911]

Originally Posted by cool_chick

He just couldn't resist himself, could he? LOL. Now where's that cherry?

Why, it's right here:

MLK? Clinton has a dream. http://www.nypost.com/seven/01212008/news/regionalnews/bill_has_a_dream_474243.htm

[Hugh R]

must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another mans freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro the wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating that absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.


I gotta say I hadn't read this before by MLK, but he was definitely right. If your a KKK'r, or a ultra leftie, you at least know where someone stands.

Mule, I don't usually enter into the fray with your postings, but your arguments about the use of the N word now being in rap and movies has absolutely nothing to do with when MLK was writing about it. The fact that blacks, use the term now as a salutation, or a self degading or whatever.... has exactly zero to do with a white man calling a black man a nigger in the 50s and 60s and knowing he would most likely get away with it.

Also, while I'm one of the first people to denounce affirmative action today. I also recognize that whites in this country start off with an edge over people of other races, They're WHITE! I've hired several blacks, females, asians and hispanics in my life, and everyone of them I thought a little bit more about hiring than the white guy. Why? Simple, I was running a consulting business where I mostly had to deal with WHITE MALE clients, and my team had to be able to sell themselves, and the company, to get work. What I ended up hiring was some rather exceptional talent, in part because they had to be better than the WHITE GUY to be perceived as being as effective, or more so. So you see, they actually do have to work harder to get to the same place. Having said that, I'm still against affirmative action. I don't know about you, but I want the best surgeon working on my heart transplant. Even if it means the black surgeon had to work a lot harder to get into medical school than the white guy. As long as he was the better student, not the one who didn't have to jump as high.

[Mule]

I don't equate the use of the "N" word in the 50's with rappers today. However, the NCAAP did feel justified in having a "funeral" for the "N" word. The rappers must've missed that. And I guess the "Magnolia Hoes" arent insulted by that as long as "knappy headed" is left out. I will believe affirmative action is a legitimate approach when I see the NBA hiring Vietnamese.

Starting at center, "Hung Ngyuen." I have a dream!

[Hugh R]

Originally Posted by Mule

Starting at center, "Hung Ngyuen." I have a dream!

I used to deal with an engineer at the California Regional Water Quality Control Board-Los Angeles whose name was Huang Dong, I kid you not.

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by Hugh R

...I don't know about you, but I want the best surgeon working on my heart transplant. Even if it means the black surgeon had to work a lot harder to get into medical school than the white guy. As long as he was the better student, not the one who didn't have to jump as high....

We need to fix education before we can get rid of affirmative action.

My wife was a teacher in the NYC school system.

Predominantly low income ethnic area.

While school funds are distributed rather evenly the lower income areas do not benefit from parents ability to contribute private funds for classroom basics.

I know because each year she taught cost me thousands of my own money just to make sure her class had some "luxuries". We would hit garage sales all summer picking up used books to build her in class reading library, I purchased the arts and craft supplies, I supplied the instruments, recorders, maracas, and whatever else I cold get in quantity.

I spent 2-3 days before every school year with her cleaning and setting up the classroom. Janitors union got that negotiated out of their contract.

Low income areas, ethnic or white, are not starting off with the same set of tools. Add in the crap that comes with being ethnic and you are starting the uphill battle from the bottom of a hole, not base camp.

Just because they got into college does not mean they get an automatic pass. They still need to do the work once they are there.

[Hugh R]

Stomach, your right. Unfortunately better neighborhoods are able to use the power of the PTA to raise additional funds for classrooms. Here in Los Angeles, unfortunately the state discounts that and wants to give less money per student to districts that have effective PTAs that raise outside funds. We did an auction event for the school district and raised almost $100K, the state wants to cut our funding by almost that amount. Why? according to them it's "unfair" that we have an alternative method of raising funds. WTF, this is where I disagree with the "minorities" they can do the same thing, if they want to get their ***** together. I understand the "handicap" issue, of race, but because we (I) take the initiative to find alternative sources of revenue I (we) shouldn't be penalized.

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by Hugh R

Stomach, your right. Unfortunately better neighborhoods are able to use the power of the PTA to raise additional funds for classrooms. Here in Los Angeles, unfortunately the state discounts that and wants to give less money per student to districts that have effective PTAs that raise outside funds. We did an auction event for the school district and raised almost $100K, the state wants to cut our funding by almost that amount. Why? according to them it's "unfair" that we have an alternative method of raising funds. WTF, this is where I disagree with the "minorities" they can do the same thing, if they want to get their ***** together. I understand the "handicap" issue, of race, but because we (I) take the initiative to find alternative sources of revenue I (we) shouldn't be penalized.

Agreed, if you pony up your own cash you should not be penalized. It removes the incentive, why should you bust your a55 just to break even?

But we need to figure out a way to help the communities with less resources to draw from.

It's a complex issue, not one I think you and I can solve discussing on a Porsche BB. Although it would be nice if it were that simple.

[jim72911t]

Stomach and Hugh,
I think we agree on some basic principals:

1: Parents should be able to raise funds for their children's education, and those funds should not be penalized.

2: Parents in communities with fewer resources (income, net worth, property values, etc.) have a more difficult time raising funds for their children's education.

A good read is Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol.

I don't have children yet, but I believe that access to quality education is paramount to our success as a society in the coming years. Sadly, quality education is seemingly not available to those in lower income brackets, regardless of race.

[cool_chick]

Originally Posted by island911

Why, it's right here:

MLK? Clinton has a dream. http://www.nypost.com/seven/01212008/news/regionalnews/bill_has_a_dream_474243.htm

You're not snowman!