To the editor:
The Register Star, befittingly, devoted front page coverage of events on Sunday honoring the life of Martin Luther King Jr.. Local officials attended and spoke on King’s message, what it meant to them personally and how it continues to inspire.
Local officials tend to speak locally, and that’s understandable. King did that also, but that’s not what got him into trouble with the government. Federal officials, like former representative Antonio Delgado, have the opportunity to take a grander view of our nation’s conduct, when and if they want to.
There were differences between King and the other revolutionaries of his time. While King practiced non-violence, the Black Panther Party and Malcolm X challenged white supremacy with militant and confrontational methods. They were not always on the same page, but they were in the same chapter of resistance.
We have to be very careful when invoking King at this time — the same time each year — and we must ask, why King? Why do we not celebrate the Black Panthers and Malcom X with the same, broad enthusiasm?
The question of broadness is easily answered. King is memorialized with a national holiday, and they’re not. This is the same nation that made him an enemy of the state, just like the other revolutionaries. So, again, the question. Why King?
I assert the state made a strategic decision to use King’s moral authority to burnish its own image. In this way, it turned a dead enemy into a live asset. His message is repeated in diluted form to ears that might as well be deaf, because it’s no longer recognizable.
He said the violence within our shores mirrors the violence we spread around the world. This is when we didn’t have 800 overseas military bases, and a hand in practically every regional war.
He spoke about the lack of economic justice here at home. This is before we learned that, in the past four decades, $50 trillion has been stolen by the 1% from the bottom 90% of workers (RAND Corp. study).
The national security state would not be on friendly terms with King if he was alive today. He would no longer be considered safe, and we know what happens to unsafe revolutionaries.
James Rothenberg
North Chatham