Martin Luther King Jr. Was a Radical. We Must Not Sterilize His Legacy
By Cornel West, Guardian UK
04 April 18
If King were alive today, his words would threaten most of those who now
sing his praises
The major threat of Martin Luther King Jr to us is a spiritual and moral
one. King's courageous and compassionate example shatters the dominant
neoliberal soul-craft of smartness, money and bombs. His grand fight against
poverty, militarism, materialism and racism undercuts the superficial lip
service and pretentious posturing of so-called progressives as well as the
candid contempt and proud prejudices of genuine reactionaries. King was
neither perfect nor pure in his prophetic witness - but he was the real
thing in sharp contrast to the market-driven semblances and simulacra of our
day.
In this brief celebratory moment of King's life and death we should be
highly suspicious of those who sing his praises yet refuse to pay the cost
of embodying King's strong indictment of the US empire, capitalism and
racism in their own lives.
We now expect the depressing spectacle every January of King's "fans" giving
us the sanitized versions of his life. We now come to the 50th anniversary
of his assassination, and we once again are met with sterilized versions of
his legacy. A radical man deeply hated and held in contempt is recast as if
he was a universally loved moderate.
These neoliberal revisionists thrive on the spectacle of their smartness and
the visibility of their mainstream status - yet rarely, if ever, have they
said a mumbling word about what would have concerned King, such as US drone
strikes, house raids, and torture sites, or raised their voices about
escalating inequality, poverty or Wall Street domination under neoliberal
administrations - be the president white or black.
The police killing of Stephon Clark in Sacramento may stir them but the
imperial massacres in Yemen, Libya or Gaza leave them cold. Why? Because so
many of King's "fans" are afraid. Yet one of King's favorite sayings was "I
would rather be dead than afraid." Why are they afraid? Because they fear
for their careers in and acceptance by the neoliberal establishment. Yet
King said angrily: "What you're saying may get you a foundation grant, but
it won't get you into the Kingdom of Truth."
The neoliberal soul craft of our day shuns integrity, honesty and courage,
and rewards venality, hypocrisy and cowardice. To be successful is to forge
a non-threatening image, sustain one's brand, expand one's pecuniary network
- and maintain a distance from critiques of Wall Street, neoliberal leaders
and especially the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and peoples.
Martin Luther King Jr turned away from popularity in his quest for spiritual
and moral greatness - a greatness measured by what he was willing to give up
and sacrifice due to his deep love of everyday people, especially vulnerable
and precious black people. Neoliberal soul craft avoids risk and evades the
cost of prophetic witness, even as it poses as "progressive".
The killing of Martin Luther King Jr was the ultimate result of the fusion
of ugly white supremacist elites in the US government and citizenry and
cowardly liberal careerists who feared King's radical moves against empire,
capitalism and white supremacy. If King were alive today, his words and
witness against drone strikes, invasions, occupations, police murders, caste
in Asia, Roma oppression in Europe, as well as capitalist wealth inequality
and poverty, would threaten most of those who now sing his praises. As he
rightly predicted: "I am nevertheless greatly saddened . that the inquirers
have not really known me, my commitment or my calling."
If we really want to know King in all of his fallible prophetic witness, we
must shed any neoliberal soul craft and take seriously - in our words and
deeds - his critiques and resistances to US empire, capitalism and
xenophobia. Needless to say, his relentless condemnation of Trump's
escalating neo-fascist rule would be unequivocal - but not to be viewed as
an excuse to downplay some of the repressive continuities of the two Bush,
Clinton and Obama administrations.
In fact, in a low moment, when the American nightmare crushed his dream,
King noted: "I don't have any faith in the whites in power responding in the
right way . they'll treat us like they did our Japanese brothers and sisters
in World War II. They'll throw us into concentration camps. The Wallaces and
the Birchites will take over. The sick people and the fascists will be
strengthened. They'll cordon off the ghetto and issue passes for us to get
in and out."
These words may sound like those of Malcolm X, but they are those of Martin
Luther King Jr - with undeniable relevance to the neo-fascist stirrings in
our day.
King's last sermon was entitled Why America May Go to Hell. His personal
loneliness and political isolation loomed large. J Edgar Hoover said he was
"the most dangerous man in America". President Johnson called him "a nigger
preacher". Fellow Christian ministers, white and black, closed their pulpits
to him. Young revolutionaries dismissed and tried to humiliate him with
walkouts, booing and heckling. Life magazine - echoing Time magazine, the
New York Times, and the Washington Post (all bastions of the liberal
establishment) - trashed King's anti-war stance as "demagogic slander that
sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi".
And the leading black journalist of the day, Carl Rowan, wrote in the
Reader's Digest that King's "exaggerated appraisal of his own
self-importance" and the communist influence on his thinking made King
"persona non-grata to Lyndon Johnson" and "has alienated many of the Negro's
friends and armed the Negro's foes".
One of the last and true friends of King, the great Rabbi Abraham Joshua
Heschel prophetically said: "The whole future of America will depend upon
the impact and influence of Dr King." When King was murdered something died
in many of us. The bullets sucked some of the free and democratic spirit out
of the US experiment. The next day over 100 American cities and towns were
in flames - the fire this time had arrived again!
Today, 50 years later the US imperial meltdown deepens. And King's radical
legacy remains primarily among the awakening youth and militant citizens who
choose to be extremists of love, justice, courage and freedom, even if our
chances to win are that of a snowball in hell! This kind of unstoppable
King-like extremism is a threat to every status quo!
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