Dear readers,
If you’re in the United States, I hope you’re having a restful Martin Luther King, Jr. day. I also hope that, wherever you are, you have a few minutes today to reflect on why this American holiday exists, and the man and the movement it honors. At this particular moment, I’m thinking about how efforts to mold the world into a slightly fairer, better place are always uneven, and how we are quick to recognize progress in hindsight while less able to identify it in the moment.
Right now, we are in a moment of backlash — to racial justice, to feminism, to progressive causes more broadly. In the Supreme Court and in many states, conservatives who are straight-up hostile to racial and gender equality have a stranglehold on politics. Culturally, the public has backed away from the big movements that solidified their organizing foundations in the Obama era and that we saw rise up during Trump’s reign: Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, the Women’s March. There have been oversteps and organizing mistakes, but the cause of this backtracking is more attributable to the usual churn — the sense of urgency fades; the cool factor dissipates.
And still. In April, it will be 55 years since Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. He was a radical in his life and his politics remain radical now; he was never the colorblind moderate he’s been painted as in popular culture. In the last 55 years, we’ve seen remarkable progress, but we’ve also seen most of Dr. King’s dreams go unrealized. The progress we have made is to the credit of Dr. King, but also to the millions of people who fought for the movement for which he became a mouthpiece. Thousands put their bodies on the line; many died. Millions more have fought on.
And so it’s worth pausing and recognizing how far we’ve coming, while looking forward at how far remains to go — and asking yourself what you’re doing to help get us collectively there.
A few things to read today:
Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail
Perry Bacon in the Washington Post: The racial reckoning led to lots of talk but little real change.
Calvin Trillin on the hours before the ‘I Have a Dream’ speech.
Anything else you’re reading today that you’re finding heartening, informative, orinspiring? Feel free to share in the comments.
xx Jill
I read and post about Letter From a Birmingham Jail every MLK Day. To remind everyone I know that the biggest roadblock to Racial Justice is the white moderate. That fact has not changed.
Thank you for calling attention to the importance of this day.
the podcast by Adam Tooze last friday is especially valuable, I think. #1 it covers the critical relationship between Coretta Scott King and MLK. #2 It provides some background on the inadequacy of integration as a demand in the view of many in the Black community. #3 It discusses other key Black leaders such as W.E.B. DuBoise and Paul Robinson whose carriers, were ruined by FBI and State Department attacks. #4 It has valuable material on the connection between economic and racial justice. #5 It covers a set of amazing events in Atlanta after MLK received the Nobel prize. https://foreignpolicy.com/podcasts/ones-and-tooze/the-economic-philosophy-of-martin-luther-king-jr/