Last week, I reprinted one of Martin Luther King's speeches, in honor of his birthday. I also saw that various people had honored Mr. King in one way or another on various social media, including FaceBook. I happened to notice a tribute someone had posted on FaceBook in which the person pointed out that Martin Luther King, Jr. had never burned buildings, rioted, or killed anyone during the years he lead the Civil Rights movement for Black Americans, yet he had accomplished so much. Someone responded to the post by saying that it is about time that Martin Luther King Jr. Day be declared a national holiday, because Mr. King is truly a great American who should be honored as such. And I can't agree more.
Another person responded to the same post by calling Mr. King a "cheating, wife-beating, fraud who embezzled money from his own organization." This person went on to say that people who considered a man like this a hero, or a great leader, were approving of all the "things" Mr. King did in his private life. Instead, we should, according to this person, think of Dr. King only as a lying, cheating hypocrite whose leadership and legacy should be forgotten, indeed, demonized, because of all the immoral things Dr. King did "in secret." By the way, apparently these "things" weren't too very secret because many people knew about them. Dr. King, in fact, had confessed an affair to his beloved Coretta, who found it in her heart to forgive her husband and take him back into her arms. More than that, God forgave him, too. Shouldn't we?
Now, first I would like to talk about Dr. King's "cheating." He had one or more affairs during the many years he was away from his wife for extended periods of time. There is no excuse for cheating on one's spouse, and I am not making one for Mr. King. In fact the affairs apparently ate away at Martin Luther King's heart because he finally told his wife. But his close associates were not afraid to tell him he was wrong, and that is surely at least one reason that he confessed to his wife and begged her for forgiveness. So we should turn our back on him and reject all he stood for, all he gained for Black Americans?
Let's think about that. We should reject Mr. King because of his sexual affairs? Well, should we not also reject everything Benjamin Franklin stood for, reject his legacy that literally saved America...because he had an affair? Oh wait...he had so many affairs he could not, nor can history, remember them all. Not only that, he had children on both sides of the Atlantic and was rather FAMOUS for his "exploits." He was somewhat of an amorous hero! Yet there has never been a cry that we should dismiss him from the annals of American history for his sexual misbehavior. Again, I am not attempting to excuse Dr. King, just point out there seems to be a double standard here. A framer of the Constitution of the United States of America was unfaithful to his wife innumerable times, and he is honored as an American hero (as he SHOULD be!). Dr. King, fighting for Black people, for the rights that were theirs actually from day one of the birth of the United States, had two affairs (granted, maybe there were more he did not admit to, but we do not know if that is the case or not) and some people want him discredited as a hypocrite and fraud.
The person writing about Mr. King called him a "wife-beater." Try as I might, I have not found a single shred of evidence that Martin ever beat Coretta, nor that she ever accused him of such. Mr. King's widow and children have had years to make such allegations and have not, though they have written prolifically since King's assassination. Yet many people, including the writer I mentioned earlier ( I am using the term "writer" very generously in describing this person, I am sure), state as fact that Dr. King got drunk and beat his wife on several occasions. Even with all the FBI spies and wiretaps, this "fact" was never borne out, and was NEVER alleged, at least publicly, by the FBI. The allegation deserves no further attention in this blog.
The allegation that King embezzled money from his political organization was never borne out by investigations nor by FBI spying, and deserves no further mention here.
Finally, the person who was responding to the FaceBook post called Dr. King a "fraud." There were allegations that Dr. King had plagiarized much of his dissertation from an earlier doctorate candidate's dissertation. The fact, as can be easily researched, is that Dr. King's dissertation has been re-examined by several scholarly authorities and found to be at least enough of Dr. King's own work that it did not meet the academic standard for plagiarism, and thus has been reaffirmed as an acceptable dissertation.
Another area in which Dr. King has been called a fraud is his "I Have a Dream" speech. He did in fact borrow some of the ideas for this speech from a sermon delivered by another Baptist minister several years earlier. Again, however, Dr. King used only some of the ideas from that sermon, added his own commentary and his own ideas, reworked them, and delivered one of the most moving speeches of all time. Again, there is no basis to call him a fraud on this account. Anyone who has attended church services for more than a few years has heard his or her very own pastor reuse and recycle other sermons delivered by other ministers. Yet we have not demanded that these pastors be run out of town on a rail!
Unlike Jesus Christ, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was very much a human being. He was certainly quite human that terrible evening in Memphis when he was felled by hater's bullet. He bled just as red as anyone, as even you or me. Unlike Jesus, Dr. King was subject to being overcome by human failings, including the desire for sex outside his marriage.
In fact (and I mean facts which can easily be checked both in printed media and on the Internet) the basis for most of the discrediting "facts" about Martin Luther King, Jr. can be traced directly back to J. Edgar Hoover and the many special agents who followed Hoover's every order (LEGAL OR NOT!) as if Hoover himself were God. Hoover decided early on that Dr. King was a "national security" concern. As Hoover himself put it, "that is the most dangerous Negro on the North American continent." (See the many FBI reports for this and other quotes about Dr. King) Hoover sent his men across the nation to dig any dirt they could find on King, and to plant wiretaps and microphones at every conceivable location that Mr. King might appear. Papers that have become public record bear out the fact that the FBI, again acting at Mr. Hoover's behest, "planted" newspaper articles and sent "anonymous" letters accusing Dr. King of many improprieties, the allegations eventually becoming "fact," as is so often the case.
Some people may not want Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to be honored in any way, and to that end they take any chance they get to continue spreading the "facts" about Dr. King; the "facts" which over and over have been found to be lies, exaggerations, and rumors, mostly propagated by the FBI. J. Edgar Hoover was most alarmed at Dr. King's large following and the huge influence he held over the Black American population. As the REAL facts have shown, Hoover didn't let TRUTH stand in the way of a good propaganda campaign against Dr. King.
I stand by my previous post, and I hold up Dr. King to be a true American Hero deserving, as much as any American hero, of the day named to celebrate his memory by the United States Congress. More important than that, I stand by the words of Jesus himself, who said, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called THE CHILDREN OF GOD."
For all his human failings, Dr. King was a peacemaker, and without doubt, is a Child of God.
Another person responded to the same post by calling Mr. King a "cheating, wife-beating, fraud who embezzled money from his own organization." This person went on to say that people who considered a man like this a hero, or a great leader, were approving of all the "things" Mr. King did in his private life. Instead, we should, according to this person, think of Dr. King only as a lying, cheating hypocrite whose leadership and legacy should be forgotten, indeed, demonized, because of all the immoral things Dr. King did "in secret." By the way, apparently these "things" weren't too very secret because many people knew about them. Dr. King, in fact, had confessed an affair to his beloved Coretta, who found it in her heart to forgive her husband and take him back into her arms. More than that, God forgave him, too. Shouldn't we?
Now, first I would like to talk about Dr. King's "cheating." He had one or more affairs during the many years he was away from his wife for extended periods of time. There is no excuse for cheating on one's spouse, and I am not making one for Mr. King. In fact the affairs apparently ate away at Martin Luther King's heart because he finally told his wife. But his close associates were not afraid to tell him he was wrong, and that is surely at least one reason that he confessed to his wife and begged her for forgiveness. So we should turn our back on him and reject all he stood for, all he gained for Black Americans?
Let's think about that. We should reject Mr. King because of his sexual affairs? Well, should we not also reject everything Benjamin Franklin stood for, reject his legacy that literally saved America...because he had an affair? Oh wait...he had so many affairs he could not, nor can history, remember them all. Not only that, he had children on both sides of the Atlantic and was rather FAMOUS for his "exploits." He was somewhat of an amorous hero! Yet there has never been a cry that we should dismiss him from the annals of American history for his sexual misbehavior. Again, I am not attempting to excuse Dr. King, just point out there seems to be a double standard here. A framer of the Constitution of the United States of America was unfaithful to his wife innumerable times, and he is honored as an American hero (as he SHOULD be!). Dr. King, fighting for Black people, for the rights that were theirs actually from day one of the birth of the United States, had two affairs (granted, maybe there were more he did not admit to, but we do not know if that is the case or not) and some people want him discredited as a hypocrite and fraud.
The person writing about Mr. King called him a "wife-beater." Try as I might, I have not found a single shred of evidence that Martin ever beat Coretta, nor that she ever accused him of such. Mr. King's widow and children have had years to make such allegations and have not, though they have written prolifically since King's assassination. Yet many people, including the writer I mentioned earlier ( I am using the term "writer" very generously in describing this person, I am sure), state as fact that Dr. King got drunk and beat his wife on several occasions. Even with all the FBI spies and wiretaps, this "fact" was never borne out, and was NEVER alleged, at least publicly, by the FBI. The allegation deserves no further attention in this blog.
The allegation that King embezzled money from his political organization was never borne out by investigations nor by FBI spying, and deserves no further mention here.
Finally, the person who was responding to the FaceBook post called Dr. King a "fraud." There were allegations that Dr. King had plagiarized much of his dissertation from an earlier doctorate candidate's dissertation. The fact, as can be easily researched, is that Dr. King's dissertation has been re-examined by several scholarly authorities and found to be at least enough of Dr. King's own work that it did not meet the academic standard for plagiarism, and thus has been reaffirmed as an acceptable dissertation.
Another area in which Dr. King has been called a fraud is his "I Have a Dream" speech. He did in fact borrow some of the ideas for this speech from a sermon delivered by another Baptist minister several years earlier. Again, however, Dr. King used only some of the ideas from that sermon, added his own commentary and his own ideas, reworked them, and delivered one of the most moving speeches of all time. Again, there is no basis to call him a fraud on this account. Anyone who has attended church services for more than a few years has heard his or her very own pastor reuse and recycle other sermons delivered by other ministers. Yet we have not demanded that these pastors be run out of town on a rail!
Unlike Jesus Christ, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was very much a human being. He was certainly quite human that terrible evening in Memphis when he was felled by hater's bullet. He bled just as red as anyone, as even you or me. Unlike Jesus, Dr. King was subject to being overcome by human failings, including the desire for sex outside his marriage.
In fact (and I mean facts which can easily be checked both in printed media and on the Internet) the basis for most of the discrediting "facts" about Martin Luther King, Jr. can be traced directly back to J. Edgar Hoover and the many special agents who followed Hoover's every order (LEGAL OR NOT!) as if Hoover himself were God. Hoover decided early on that Dr. King was a "national security" concern. As Hoover himself put it, "that is the most dangerous Negro on the North American continent." (See the many FBI reports for this and other quotes about Dr. King) Hoover sent his men across the nation to dig any dirt they could find on King, and to plant wiretaps and microphones at every conceivable location that Mr. King might appear. Papers that have become public record bear out the fact that the FBI, again acting at Mr. Hoover's behest, "planted" newspaper articles and sent "anonymous" letters accusing Dr. King of many improprieties, the allegations eventually becoming "fact," as is so often the case.
Some people may not want Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to be honored in any way, and to that end they take any chance they get to continue spreading the "facts" about Dr. King; the "facts" which over and over have been found to be lies, exaggerations, and rumors, mostly propagated by the FBI. J. Edgar Hoover was most alarmed at Dr. King's large following and the huge influence he held over the Black American population. As the REAL facts have shown, Hoover didn't let TRUTH stand in the way of a good propaganda campaign against Dr. King.
I stand by my previous post, and I hold up Dr. King to be a true American Hero deserving, as much as any American hero, of the day named to celebrate his memory by the United States Congress. More important than that, I stand by the words of Jesus himself, who said, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called THE CHILDREN OF GOD."
For all his human failings, Dr. King was a peacemaker, and without doubt, is a Child of God.
No comments:
Post a Comment