Beck: Letter From Birmingham Jail
"Letter From Birmingham Jail"
Read this, right now, ladies and gentlemen. All of it. Today. This man was not a racist: he wrote this for all of us. It's more important now than ever before.
posted by Concerned American | 6:38 PM
11 Comments:
There are a lot of issues raised by this letter, and a lot of Constitutional issues were raised during this period in our history. Instead of getting into all that (because it's a bloody nasty can of worms wherever it is opened), I'd like to highlight the sentence that is pretty much, in my opinion, the crux of what he wrote. The following sentences defining "just" and "unjust" laws are important, too.
"Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws."
Bingo.
Resist.
"I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice..."
Sounds familiar.
Why should we love and revere MLK, when he proved by his own life that he was pretty fond of stepping outside of marriage and fucking other people's women, as he pretended to preach God's word?
I get pretty tired of efforts to descend to the level of the other side's hypocrisies. Having a MLK day is an example of that. Why not have a day to celebrate Walter Williams? He's black too, but smarter than MLK ever was. And Walter Williams has had a better anchor to his late wife, than MLK ever did with his live wife at the time while MLK fucked everything in sight.
Housecats get a day off to celebrate MLK? What does this tell us about how low our society has come?
Counterpoint:
http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/018435.html
What amazes me is that Beck should be capable of SEEING the points Auster's correspondent is making there - but he doesn't. 95% of the time, Beck is interesting and worthwhile. The other 5%, he's as irrationally ultra-liberal as they come.
It's the weirdest sort of blind spot.
Here, let me edit this:
"One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for [might makes right democratic majority rule]"
If this is truly MLK's viewpoint, then he is a submissive pacifist weirdo. Submitting to evil laws and evil punishment when you don't have to is warped. I have heard the argument that an outright armed military claiming of his oppressed groups' freedom would have resulted in a genocidal race war which his side would not have won. After seeing Afghanistan/Vietnam/Korea hold off the combined might of the US forces, I find that claim dubious.
What kind of moral mindset does it put you it for your great leaders to tell you your morally highest ground is to beg for your freedom from your oppressors? Massa, massa, don't beat me so much! That's not very empowering, is it?
I'm ashamed to say I don't believe I've ever read anything MLK wrote before today. Even though I do not view myself as a bigot or a separatist, I was never involved, nor had any appreciation for this man's obvious wisdom.
Thank you, Pete, for posting Beck's link to this incredible document. The actions of that on-going struggle to be free as a race echo in our struggles to be free as a nation.
Rights come from experience: systematically abridging a right is a mistake that risks a genocide. You say your rights come from God, He told you so. How can I tell that you've received a true communication from God, and it's not just the gray aliens beaming messages into your brain? What's the standard of evidence here? How can I cross-examine your religious experience? Instead of saying "natural rights" you should instead say "in my opinion", and the debate will proceed more honestly.
First the wisdom of "Thurgood," and now Daddy King. This is the kind of garbage I'd expect to see posted at Sipsey Street...with comments opposing swiftly deleted, natch.
After the republic was destroyed in Rome, it became standard practice to deify late emperors and their family members. Ray's bullet transformed Daddy into the closest thing we have to a civic god. If only he'd lived, we'd probably be placing him with the other race-hustlers and wouldn't have to endure this endless castigation of whites in his holy name.
Actually, in re-reading the letter, I was amused by MLK's castigation of the white moderates.
Think the nice moderate folks are our friends, either?
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
Same with a bunch of American icons - there's something to learn there, too.
Think the nice moderate folks are our friends, either?
CA, therein, I think, lies the crux of the problem, moderate folks, statist to the core.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home