The actual quote, by Dr. Martin Luther King, in Letter from a Birmingham Jail, is
“I am in Birmingham because injustice is here”
For today’s post, I just want to echo the call by a brilliant scholar and dear colleague, Lisa Schweitzer, and encourage you to read Letter from a Birmimgham Jail in its entirety, as well as anything else by Dr. King. You can find a listing of his other writings and sermons and speeches here. His words are a powerful call to action and motivational read on any day, and if you haven’t re-read his words lately, you owe it to yourself to do so, especially today on this MLK holiday.
I want to thank Lisa for her thought-provoking tribute to Dr. King on her blog today, calling on readers to read Letter from a Birmingham jail and appreciate the political philosophy it contains. (Actually everything on Lisa’s blog, which is all about cities and urban development and academia and life and how we can all do better is smart and worth reading. You can check her blog out here.
In Letter, Dr. King was writing to seemingly well-meaning White clergy and others who were questioning non-violent direct action, sit-ins and marches for civil rights. These would-be allies were sounding out the sadly familiar, reflexive wrong-headed refrain reacting to righteous protest with appeals for “calm” and “patience” (aka the best friends of injustice). He was also speaking about their acceptance of the argument that civil rights activists were a dangerous and influential “outsiders”–mysterious agitators who disturbed the peace (read: disrupted the horrific status quo).
It’s funny (not funny) how the same rhetoric prevails today when people come together to protest the unjust taking of human life, particularly painful given our history and ongoing legacy of racial violence and injustice in the US and globally when that life is Black or another person of color, and the taker is White or someone acting under the cover of authority or not. Lisa poignantly points to Dr. King’s demise at the hands of White violence, which took him from us much too soon.
Even more damaging is the verbal diarrhea of “whataboutism” whenever people call attention to these acts of racial violence against ethnic or racial minorities. What about violence against [put in your individual or group or country or religion, etc. of choice]. It’s a totally intentional logical fallacy, and a red herring, of course, meant to distract, dilute and dissuade. Of course no one is saying that only anti-Black violence is bad and other violence is good. Just like the powerful rallying cry, Black Lives Matter obviously is meant to call sharp attention to the fact that every life should matter and be valued equally, even though that is not yet our reality. I just wonder: does that actually need to be explained? And can we stay on topic?
In any case, Dr. King, master scribe and orator, makes the case perfectly:
“Injustice anywhere, is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Rest in power.
Happy MLK Day everyone.
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