It’s been more than 50 years since the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. We’re within seven years of the centennial of his birth. Yet, instead of bearing down on his ideals of justice and equality, it feels like we’re moving farther away.
It doesn’t have to be that way. It cannot be that way. MLK’s message and example can help us move away from the political toxicity and blame-mongering and divisions, and toward connection again. Toward progress, both personal and in our communities, and toward progress in tackling problems in a joint and even joyous way, with shared purpose instead of finger-pointing.
This past week, more Americans — young and old — died, needlessly cut down in senseless murders. And other Americans are charged or suspected in their deaths.
It doesn’t have to be that way. If we work together to find the will, the resources, the energy to address violence, it may not have to be that way. If we accept that generational poverty is corrosive and debilitating. If we accept that childhood lead-poisoning can have lifelong impacts, impeding futures and stunting the quality of lives. If we accept that discrimination itself can be corrosive and debilitating across generations, even if it’s not readily identifiable and visible to all.
These are not radical thoughts. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. recognized that being Black and poor in a system that kept those of color from advancing was a legacy that had to end. But he also knew that breaking this cycle required a broad societal awakening, a truly multicultural and multiracial enterprise of shared progress and fairness.
In cities across the nation, we confront the daily reality that we are far from achieving the dream of a place where someone can be valued and supported based solely on the content of their character. But even MLK recognized this must be the hard work of generations, once we saw and accepted why it’s needed.
Which is why embracing MLK’s goals doesn’t just mean working for racial equity and justice and against poverty. It encompasses so much more: finding our commonalities; listening to one another; empathizing and understanding and becoming educated in others’ reality without the distortions of wishful thinking, stereotypes, and fear.
As many of us have experienced on MLK Day, when commemorative events and volunteerism tend to bring us together, there is tremendous joy in reaching out and joining hands with someone who doesn’t look like you, who doesn’t come from the same religious or ethnic or racial background — but who you recognize holds in their hearts the same human values and aspirations and goals.
This week, as we mark the 93rd year since Martin Luther King Jr.’s birth in Atlanta, can we commit to looking past differences — political, ideological, and in our belief systems — and extending that hand of hope and help to another? Tomorrow, on MLK Day, a national day of service, can we also serve our communities and our children’s and grandchildren’s futures simply by speaking more mildly, by holding our minds open?
Can we each try to understand, on the one hand, why some are concerned about new teaching initiatives, why no one wants schools to teach and entrench victimhood, but also, on the other hand, why it’s so critical that our schools not be handcuffed in being able to teach the full reality of our nation’s history, or why many teachers feel they already do?
As a nation, we can’t have a full, free and honest conversation about a difficult topic like racism without having a common understanding of its roots, branches and fruit.
This isn’t pie in the sky. Martin Luther King Jr. was a real human being with all the flaws we all share, inevitably, when we walk this Earth. But he taught us that one can step out of one’s self. One can aspire and inspire, urge change and then have the courage to change. One can step out of one’s comfort zone and speak eloquent truths that reach others willing to leave their safe spaces. And once one reaches out, finding the hands of others of good will, those difficult goals of peace and justice will turn out to be easier to achieve through cooperation and understanding. The reward: a safer future for our children and communities, and a stronger and more secure nation, and more just and stable world. It can be done, if we keep our minds open and join hands in hope and harmony.
— Tribune News Service
