Happy 80th Birthday MLK
 

One can only imagine what he would say if he could be alive to see today.




Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.


I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek.

- Letters from a Birmingham Jail


In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.



I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.


- I have a Dream


I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values.


This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all mankind.

-Beyond Vietnam



I do have a question: In your opinion, how much different do you think America would be had he not have been assassinated?

Would America already had seen a Black President?

How much more aware would the US or the world be of the cultural division here in the US and how much more (or less) progress would we have made towards bringing the country together?

It's recognized this Monday, isn't it?

The Holiday is...his actual birthday is today.

But I thought it was always honored on Monday.

ETA: I just misread your post. Yeah, that's what I thought.

But we are allowed to wish him a happy birthday on his actual birthday.

Go ahead, no one's stopping you.

Back in the day before it was made a federal holiday, most cities (at least Baltimore and DC) celebrated his actual birthday and thus most local jurisdictions down.

My only nitpick is since MLK has a holiday on the 3rd Monday, most calendars do not denote the actual birthday anymore.

Some places still don't honor it. To me, that's sad.

Don't get me started on that...heh

I can only imagine what will happen if (HUMONGOUS IF at that) ever serious talk comes around to Obama's bithrday or something like that akin to a national holiday.

I doubt they would make Obama's birthday a national holiday. He would be apart of Presidents day.

Oh I know that but.....if Lincoln can get one....hehe

Funny that you mention that...I also remember for a long while before it was all consolidated into President's Day, local jurisdictions used to close for Washington and Lincoln's B day and I really think that aprt of just having ONE day to celebrate elminated the confusion that sometimes occured when their birthdays fell on weird days of the week

Does he?

ETA: I just found out that a US Airways A320 airbus just crashed into the Hudson River. It's on t.v. It just happened.

Used to...

hey, start a thread up when more gets reported....some sad news to hear on a day / week like this.

ETA Damn Benz!!!

Benzgirl already did. She's watching it on CNN. I think they're getting some of the passengers out safely.

Honestly, I cannot imagine a world with MLK still alive. I guess to me it is the same as if Christ was not crucified and resurrected. I am not one to really speculate, but if I were to do so, MLK's impact would not be what it is today. I think his mode of "non-violence" and "civil disobedience" would have started to get old--which is was at the time of his death and that the US would have fractured further. IDK? I think that the division would have gone unresolved and we would see something similar to that seen in places like France in the Bonne Heures.

Happy Birthday, Dr. King! This year, you'd be proud!

My students asked if they could sing happy birthday in his honor. Their teacher only allowed it if they sang the Stevie Wonder version.

Of course being that most of my students are born between 1997-99, their response was "who?? Whaaa??" As she belted out a really off-key version.

Ok back to your regular scheduled program.

So, you are saying that his death was more impactful than his life?

I agree with you on that!

Progress possibly would have taken longer to make had he lived a complete life.

Here is one...what if he survived the assassination and no I am not talking abot the Boondocks version.

IMO, unfortunately, yes. But that is my opinion. IDK if that would be the truth.

The person thought to have shot MLK was a sharp shooter, like "Hitman", he never misses. MLK was shot execution style from 30 yards out with a round hollow tip rifle and a scope. His patterns were traced for a solid 2-3 weeks. It was expected what he would be doing on April 4, 1968.

When the opportunity arose to take the shot, the shooter did. Now, while I do think that James Earl Ray was the shooter, I don't think he was the only person involved in the plot. I think that is the conspiracy theory.

I still think to some degree...the assassinations of MLK and Malcolm X were systematic drive people from one camp to the other and once people saw that the gov't was willing to pick them off by dirty means...scatter the herd.

Usually when you cut the head off of a hydra another one grows back....this wasn't the case because for one...too many groups had too many different ideas to get to the same goal...like the Black Panthers.

Then there was those coming back from Vietnam trying to readjust to life in the US and seeing that they were getting as much love here as they did there being shot at by the VC, many found it difficult.

I also actually believe that as their stances changed and their ideologies made it to a point that their paths instead of being parallel began to converge, the government got scared.

When the seeds of dissention were sown, and the heads of the movement were struck down one after the other, the power base scattered like roaches.



"America today finds herself in a unique situation. Historically, revolutions are bloody. Oh, yes, they are. They haven’t never had a blood-less revolution, or a non-violent revolution. That don’t happen even in Hollywood. You don’t have a revolution in which you love your enemy, and you don’t have a revolution in which you are begging the system of exploitation to integrate you into it. Revolutions overturn systems. Revolutions destroy systems.

A revolution is bloody, but America is in a unique position. She’s the only country in history in a position actually to become involved in a blood-less revolution."

- Malcolm X, The Ballot or the Bullet