Afterthoughts on MLK Day

Will enough white people EVER be able to connect the dots so they can actually understand and appreciate a courageous Black American like The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King?

I doubt it.

I am a white person who is fed up with all the other white people who keep ruining Martin Luther King Day for me and everyone else. Surprise! It happened again this year, too. (Are you listening, Mr. Trump? Or are you still fretting about those hungry alligators at Mar-A-Largo?)

No, it’s not their genuine ignorance that bothers me. What really gripes — and mystifies — me is their self-aggrandizing stupidity about the Civil Rights movement in American History. They seem to wear their appalling disinterest as a badge of honor. That, along with those enduring character smears about Dr. King, really get to me on MLK Day.

And if you don’t know what I’m talking about, gentle reader, you are probably a white person yourself who still doesn’t get it.

Let’s face it: this reluctance of too many White Americans to respectfully acknowledge such an outstanding citizen and reformer lingers on — 35 years after the federal holiday in his name was officially declared. Why?

Here are a few thoughts on the matter.

When I was growing up, I heard few positive conversations about Reverend Martin Luther King — and not because the conversationalists were cross-burning KKK diehards. They weren’t. They were just seriously misinformed. But they were also engaging in the worst kind of racism: the low-grade gossipy kind. The kind that made them believe they weren’t racists when they were. They definitely were.

No, they didn’t openly declare their race was superior. But they quietly decided the behavior of this non-white person was inferior to their own moral ideals. They were to quick to judge Dr. King and believe the worst about him just because he wasn’t white like them. That’s more than being just “a little racist.”

Most of the verbal exchanges about him that I remember usually ignored factual information and leaned into urban-myth-chat. Decidedly negative and derogatory chatter, in other words. Not only did they consider this black guy to be a rabble rouser who lived to stir up trouble, they also pegged him as the worst kind of hypocrite.

That is, he only pretended to be this holier-than-thou minister when, in reality, he was running around with (GASP!) prostitutes!

It didn’t matter if his womanizing was fake news or defamatory gossip, either. A lot of people — mostly white ones — believed it. They believed without question or proof that he was a no-good scoundrel cheating on his wife.

Shame on him!

So pervasive was that image of him as a smug adulterer that it entered into some kind of white collective consciousness that never went away. A lot of white people usually knew about his “womanizing” and didn’t hesitate to say so. I even heard a taped interview of former First Lady Jackie Kennedy lamenting about his indiscretions. (?!!!).

Yeah, that same Jackie Kennedy who was married to the all-time uber womanizer himself: President John F. Kennedy. She didn’t talk about her own husband’s infidelities on tape, though. She chose instead to mention how awful it was about Dr. King with “all those women.”

(Sigh.) You just can’t make this stuff up…

Throughout the 1960’s and beyond, these character attacks on this well-meaning civil rights leader continued. And predominantly white households seemed to accept the worst about Dr. King with little or no hesitation. Conversations often focused on how he was too flawed to be considered heroic. If someone would interject anything complimentary about his religious work or inspirational speeches, someone else would immediately bring up his womanizing. If someone would praise him for making such an impact on human rights, someone else would immediately bring up his womanizing. Then too, there was follow-up criticism about how he stayed at the best hotels and dined on prime rib while his poor followers languished in jail.

Although I have no evidence to prove or disprove charges of his womanizing or “high living,” I can confidently state that those accusations sounded — and still sound — like B.S. to me. Why? Because of J. Edgar Hoover.

J. Edgar Hoover, former head of the FBI, was out to get Martin Luther King.

Hoover just didn’t launch a vendetta against him, he sent out battleships loaded with Furies after him. Of course, fifty or sixty years ago, few people knew how obsessed he was to find dirt on MLK. Now government documents and files reveal this head of the FBI once had his own enemies list. For reasons that make little or no sense to us now, Hoover thought this civil rights leader was a communist. He stalked Dr. King as though he were some kind of criminal. Hoover resorted to surveillance, wiretapping, and bugging to catch his target red-handed. He couldn’t, though.

He couldn’t find any serious crimes or treasonous activities because MLK wasn’t a master criminal or a communist.

That didn’t stop J. Edgar, though.

Somehow, in some way, he got the word out that Dr. King was a hypocritical, un-American womanizer. Without any Twitter or Facebook or cable news propaganda network like FOX NOOZ, he trashed MLK’s character. Exactly how remains unclear. He must have leaked it out himself.

So paranoid was Hoover in his mission of destruction that any dirt he dug up should have been taken with a grain of salt. Or completely dismissed altogether. Even if these things about Martin Luther King WERE true, they had no place in any discussion about his contributions. And yet, these beliefs about his personal life are still cited as reasons NOT to honor his memory. His detractors still think if they can rack up enough faults they can destroy his legacy.

Unfortunately, it seems to be working.

Being curious in the investigative sense, I tried to learn more about this major quirk of injustice. What really happened here? I tried to talk about it — to better examine and explore it — when I reached adulthood.

How could mere gossip about a celebrated public figure carry so much destructive power?

Why should the personal life of any American be exposed this way in the court of public opinion?

Do different government agencies like the FBI really have THAT MUCH power over the media and how news is revealed to the public?

Unfortunately, at that time, many things about Hoover — including his personal attacks and cross-dressing — remained hidden from public scrutiny.

Then too, whenever I brought up the subject, others focused on the underlying racism that led to the character smear, not on the unethical M.O. behind it. Start wondering about racism and the proverbial can of worms pops open. Whenever a white person tries to directly address any aspects of racism he’s always labeled a racist himself. Ouch! Why is that? Needless to say, I had to stop being so direct. Otherwise I’d forever bear the stigma of bad guy in a white sheet.

Sad but true. Misinformation and misunderstandings continue to thrive in 21st Century America. It’s going on, and it keeps going on and on, but no one wants to admit it. Or think about it. And they should. And we should all start thinking about it.

A significant number of Americans(again, mostly white ones who don’t want to own it or admit it) still refuse to give MLK his due. They still seem defiant about keeping as many schools, libraries, and businesses open as possible on this federal holiday. Although they know it’s racist and incendiary, they still like to refer to MLK Day as “their holiday.” Almost as if they want to perpetrate the notion that this day of commemoration is no big deal because Martin Luther King himself was no big deal. As in How come he gets a federal holiday? Why are we celebrating Martin Luther King? What did he really do, anyway?

Believe it or not, these questions still get tossed around every year in some white households with no answers in sight. That’s appalling. Dr King’s place in American History deserves to be recognized and celebrated by everyone. But not everyone gets it. Unless thoughtful discussions start to take place, though, misunderstandings and ignorance will prevail. So why not put the bias and scuttlebutt aside and start looking at MLK’s life with fresh eyes?

If you want to flex your gray cells, you’ll find all kinds of historical information and biographical material about him at the library(Old School) and online(New Age). Go on. Read a little. Research. Investigate.

Meanwhile, here are my condensed — and yes, opinionated — answers to those questions too many Americans don’t want answered.

Too many Americans have forgotten how badly African-American(AKA Black Americans, Negroes, Americans) have been treated in this country. Although they are American citizens, their skin color once meant they would be enslaved. Even after slavery ended with The Emancipation Proclamation, basic rights and freedoms would be denied to them. Fundamental rights and privileges taken for granted by most white citizens often became an impossible dream for non-white ones. Most black citizens couldn’t eat, sit, swim, walk, drive, or congregate in the ways their white counterparts could easily do. For them, things like due process, voting, healthcare, and a good and affordable education simply weren’t available because of their skin color.

I’m not just talking about the sham of “separate but equal” facilities in the Deep South, either. I’m talking about vast pockets of injustice throughout America, from Denver to Detroit, from Miami to Minneapolis, from St. Louis to Hollywood. For too long, black people were still 3rd class citizens in America.

Now usually when people keep getting subjugated like that, year in, year out, they finally rebel in a big way. They finally declare war on their oppressors. They launch bloody insurrections. Then amid the unforgiving civil unrest and terrorist attacks, they overthrow the existing regime that had mistreated them for so long.

But no bloody revolts occurred in the United States when Black Americans finally asserted their civil rights en masse — because of Martin Luther King.

He was able to unite diverse groups of angry, hurting, sometimes hopeless Black Americans into non-violent demonstrators. This minister was able to combine basic precepts of Christianity with Gandhi’s tactics of non-aggressive protest. The result? A united front that became an effective tool for change.

Of course, not every single black person in America immediately liked his strategy and went along with it. But in time, so many African-Americans participated in these concerted non-violent demonstrations that life-altering changes did take place. And yes, they WERE peaceful demonstrations. The violence that got documented by photographers and TV cameramen at these protests came from white police mercilessly beating peaceful black demonstrators. The real bloody revolts came from the white — not the black — citizens.

The only time significant numbers of the black community ever engaged in violent protests occurred after Dr. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968… How sad and ironic that such an inspirational clergyman who devoted his life to peace and lovingkindness should die by senseless gun violence.

But The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King was the real reason White America wasn’t subjected to continuous violent civil unrest and bloody rebellion in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement.

He was able to achieve peaceful change in America without resorting to the violence so many other countries experienced when the oppressed finally pushed back against their oppressors. That’s truly an amazing thing worth celebrating. Anyone who can inspire and encourage the downtrodden to affect change peacefully, then actually help them make things better is a hero in my book…and he should be one in your book, too.

A Leader for Peaceful Change: that’s a good enough reason to have a federal holiday in MLK’s name, isn’t it?

In his famous speech, Martin Luther King said he had a dream. So do I. But in my dream, the white people actually connected the dots. They finally understood why America gave MLK a special day of remembrance. And they finally overcame their own prejudices so they could fully appreciate February as Black History Month.