What They're Feeding Me

The march is in ten hours from the time I am writing this. More on it after it takes place.

Martin Luther King was a visionary. In a very short span of time, with limited resources and working against impossible odds, he made a dream possible. Thanks to his efforts, the United States of America is a more free and just and equal place. Notice I wrote “more.” Because America is not yet perfect. Just as in “a more perfect union,” our job is never done.

When Dr. King spoke about racial justice the public lauded him as a hero, his words were moving and poetic and true. In 1963 he gave one of the most famous speeches in the history of the USA to a diverse and morally-righteous crowd gathered in Washington, D.C.

He shook the halls of Congress, the march was epic but King rocked our Capitol. The Civil Rights Act is an imperfect law, still devastating in its focus on the forced integration of the US, devastating to old ways of doing things that were just unfair.

When Martin Luther King spoke about racial injustice in 1963, the public lauded him as a hero, and laws changed in 1964. When he spoke about reparations in 1965 they mocked him and the police beat marchers ruthlessly. When he started his “Poor People’s Movement” in 1968, in his last speech, the American public sat back and watched as he rocked the foundations of economic injustice once more, just as he had rocked D.C. in 1963.

…that’s all this whole thing is about. We aren’t engaged in any negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying — We are saying that we are God’s children. And that we are God’s children, we don’t have to live like we are forced to live.

Now, what does all of this mean in this great period of history? It means that we’ve got to stay together. We’ve got to stay together and maintain unity. You know, whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite, favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the slaves fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together, something happens in Pharaoh’s court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery. When the slaves get together, that’s the beginning of getting out of slavery. Now let us maintain unity.
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We aren’t going to let any mace stop us. We are masters in our nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they don’t know what to do. I’ve seen them so often. I remember in Birmingham, Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there, we would move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out. And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth, and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, “Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me around.”
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Now the other thing we’ll have to do is this: Always anchor our external direct action with the power of economic withdrawal. Now, we are poor people. Individually, we are poor when you compare us with white society in America. We are poor. Never stop and forget that collectively — that means all of us together — collectively we are richer than all the nations in the world, with the exception of nine. Did you ever think about that? After you leave the United States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, West Germany, France, and I could name the others, the American Negro collectively is richer than most nations of the world. We have an annual income of more than thirty billion dollars a year, which is more than all of the exports of the United States, and more than the national budget of Canada. Did you know that? That’s power right there, if we know how to pool it.

We don’t have to argue with anybody. We don’t have to curse and go around acting bad with our words. We don’t need any bricks and bottles. We don’t need any Molotov cocktails. We just need to go around to these stores, and to these massive industries in our country, and say, “God sent us by here, to say to you that you’re not treating his children right. And we’ve come by here to ask you to make the first item on your agenda fair treatment, where God’s children are concerned. Now, if you are not prepared to do that, we do have an agenda that we must follow. And our agenda calls for withdrawing economic support from you.”
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But not only that, we’ve got to strengthen black institutions. I call upon you to take your money out of the banks downtown and deposit your money in Tri-State Bank. We want a “bank-in” movement in Memphis. Go by the savings and loan association. I’m not asking you something that we don’t do ourselves at SCLC. Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account here in the savings and loan association from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. We are telling you to follow what we are doing. Put your money there. You have six or seven black insurance companies here in the city of Memphis. Take out your insurance there. We want to have an “insurance-in.”

Now these are some practical things that we can do. We begin the process of building a greater economic base. And at the same time, we are putting pressure where it really hurts. I ask you to follow through here.
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The question is not, “If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me?” The question is, “If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?” That’s the question.
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Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop.

And I don’t mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!
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I’m not worried about anything.

I’m not fearing any man!

The entire speech is epic, Dr. King encourages targeting specific brands for injustices. It is a dangerous way to talk, a way that upsets the established order and causes great stress to the heads of large companies. The escaped convict who killed Dr. King, James Earl Ray, attempted to withdraw his guilty plea after initially being sentenced to 99 years in prison for assassinating the most effective civilian in recent American history. Ray died, in a cell, with hepatitis C. The man who delivered the televised announcement, Bobby Kennedy, stated toward the end of a short and solemn speech, “The vast majority of white people and the vast majority of black people in this country want to live together, want to improve the quality of our life, and want justice for all human beings who abide in our land.” He was hoping to quell the violent riots that might take place without the soothing of an official on the TV. “Let us dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.”

This is the legacy Dr. King left behind, and why we march on his holiday. The Poor People’s Movement continues, as does the struggle for Civil Rights. We are marching for a better tomorrow in honor of a great man.

To put this struggle in a modern context, the opposition to civil rights in well-meaning circles of Evangelical Christians, White Supremacists and homophobes continues. As long as people struggle against integration, against unity, the movements to eradicate injustice will remain stifled. A large and long-lasting movement for justice, with economic impact, is the only rational choice if you want change.

Presidential primary candidate Ron Paul has repeatedly said he would have voted against the Civil Rights Act because his libertarianism dictates the law unfairly forced private businesses to open their doors to people they didn’t want to serve (black people). President Barack Obama could augment the CRA with the passage of the imperfect Employment Non-Discrimination Act. ENDA would extend similar protections to people in the transgender community, but remains stalled in a partisan-gridlocked House and Senate. The current libertarian penchant for personal preference has ancient roots in the current make-up of the predominantly-Southern, predominantly-male, predominantly-white, predominantly-straight Republican Party of 2011. Many of them are old-time Democrats, from back when the Southern “Dixiecrats” were the equivalent of the Blue Dogs, a loyal vote on a few issues that mattered, but not many. There are racists in the GOP who hate the forced racial integration of the US. Not all Republicans are bigots, but a great number of bigots are openly, proudly Republican this election season, and I can only wager a guess as to what, or who, has them all riled up. ENDA is a threat to straight people who are adamantly anti-gay. Most of those activists are not going to vote for Barack Obama, no matter how hard he tries.

We must not forget our roots, as movements. The current struggle for equal rights for transgender and gay people, including marriage rights and serving openly in the military, continues a long tradition of civil rights struggle. It is a nonviolent movement for the end of segregation and injustice.

The Occupy Movement, properly focused, is a civil rights movement for the end of segregation and injustice. Specifically, 99% of all Americans are segregated from the 1% of influence-peddlers and politicians, and voting has become meaningless in the face of a wave of corporate-funded propaganda when voting in a democracy is most-high, voting itself being a natural right. Super PACs in South Carolina are spending twice as much as Candidates to air ads anonymously attacking the opposition. The next Presidential election is going to see more money than ever before spent anonymously on advertising designed to mislead and lionize. The propaganda campaign is still underway, but at least now there are people in the streets speaking out about it.