OPINION & EDITORIAL
Candidates betray King’s radicalism
Looking for a print version?
Simply choose ‘Print’ on your computer and a printer-friendly document will be generated.
Also by Kyle Szarzynski:
- Media coverage favors U.S. interests (April 2, 2008)
- Irrational fears fuel crime focus (March 26, 2008)
- Revolution deep in the hearts, minds of Americans (March 12, 2008)
- Obama's corporate crush (March 5, 2008)
Related Stories:
- District 8 endorsement (April 1, 2003)
- MLK's dream far from realized (January 23, 2002)
- Go vote! (March 22, 2007)
- Cities should laud denizens' diversity (February 1, 2006)
- True liberty for all knows no boundaries (April 15, 2008)
by Kyle Szarzynski
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
The 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination last week was met with the expected crocodile tears by the presidential candidates, providing a painful display of insincerity, or just plain bad acting.
Sen. Hillary Clinton’s speech was particularly transparent: “I remember hearing about it and just feeling such despair. … I walked into my dorm room, picked up my book bag and just hurled it across the room.” She really needs to stop with this lying thing.
It hardly needs to be said that Mr. King’s message has been expropriated and morphed by today’s elite. As with most rabble-rousers and rebels whose popularity is too great to ignore, his icon has been hijacked by those who have done their best to toss his legacy into the dustbin of history. Thus, we have one presidential candidate who wants to militarily occupy Iraq for a century or more, and another who wants to expand the state-terror campaign into Pakistan, both praising an unrepentant opponent of war and imperialism.
Like I said, the disingenuousness has been painful to watch.
By almost any definition of the term, Mr. King was a radical. Countering the boring frivolity of the self-cultivating liberals of his time (their kind never changes), he knew fundamental social change was never made through the corridors of power. His tactics were extralegal and confrontational; he didn’t lobby politicians but aimed to mold their policies with the welding tools of a social movement.
An avid reader of Thoreau and follower of Gandhi, civil disobedience — including sit-ins, marches and countless run-ins with law enforcement — became the defining feature of the struggle for civil rights under his leadership.
In his time — as in ours — the law often ran contrary to humane interests, rendering it more a measure of elite power than a tool for enforcing equality. When the legal code and social justice were at odds, Mr. King never hesitated in making his mark in the latter camp. He did not put principle before human beings; his principles were human beings. In this vein, he placed himself in the proud American progressive tradition, the likes of which include Thomas Paine, Frederick Douglas, Eugene V. Debs and Malcolm X.
No, Mr. King was not a fetishist of the law. But it was more than his strategy that banishes him from the mainstream; his political vision was of a similarly radical bent. He was a proponent of people’s power, a believer in the ideal of truly democratic society. This meant organizing, agitating and more organizing and agitating, all with the goal of a tolerant, equitable and peaceful society in mind.
Concretely, this meant aggressive opposition to the war in Vietnam. He supported draft resisters and tax evaders, and came to the conclusion that the United States was “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” He denounced all imperialisms, condemning “those individual capitalists of the West” who usurp the wealth of the Third World, all in the name of profit. Comments like this wouldn’t earn one a spot on the cable news shows of 2008.
Even more “dangerous” (his term) to the establishment was his view that the root of the present violence and injustice is a system that produces ostentatious wealth amid abject destitution. “True compassion,” he said, “is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.” Out of this belief came the Poor People’s Campaign near the end of his life, the aim of which was to form “a multiracial army of the poor” to challenge the more obscene features of a profit-driven, class-based society.
Given what we know about his life and ideas, it is not presumptuous to point out that today Mr. King — though ever-praised by the likes of John McCain and Hillary Clinton — would be on the side of AWOL soldiers, impoverished prisoners and undocumented immigrants who (gasp!) overstay their visas.
Though he was radical, Mr. King undoubtedly would have wanted his vision embraced in nonpolitical terms. For there is nothing “communistic” or “extreme” about the fight for universal health care, criticizing wars for profit or defending the interests of people who don’t have the right paperwork. These are struggles based on the most elementary of human impulses — empathy, altruism, respect — and, consequently, emphasize the universality of our species. They entail that every human being should be able to live in comfort and dignity without having to grovel or ask politely for it.
The contemporary mainstream has, nonetheless, ostracized this vision as subversive and unseemly. Of course, it could be no other way; the airwaves are controlled by those with money and influence, or those who stand to lose out from Mr. King’s real message. It is therefore incumbent upon us to clean the obfuscating dirt off his unsubtle, aggressive vision, and thereby work to make it a reality.
Kyle Szarzynski (kszarzynski@badgerherald.com) is a junior majoring in Spanish and history.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 4:08am):
Thomas Paine also said jews were proved to be racially degenerate.
Real progressive! Like Russ Feingold progressive!
Not sure he would agree though...
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 5:25am):
Sen. Hillary Clinton’s speech was particularly transparent: “I remember hearing about it and just feeling such despair. … I walked into my dorm room, picked up my book bag and just hurled it across the room.” She really needs to stop with this lying thing.
_____
How does some pompous white dude from Wisconsin know what she did years ago? Were you there?
Your ego is second to the Gods, sir.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 9:26am):
2 days in a row ISO co-ops a religious figure! Once again he was a reverend! He was a Christian socialist! He pushed that dead Jew on the cross at people! So nice try, but adding King to Marx is like dividing by zero, no good can come from it.
Yes, he was a radical, but radical means reforming the system, you want him to have been a rebel. You're whoring his image just as much as the candidates, but since its for your ends its ok.
Last you want to talk about mis-represented images? You guys (Commies, Reds, fans of Cyndi Lauper) put Che up on a pedastal as a great image. He killed 17 people on his own, many of whom were non-combatants. But he gets on your shirts and walls, Bush indirectly kills a non-combatant and its horrible!! (I think both are horrible and make no attempts to say other wise)
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 9:42am):
Do you really think that today Mr King would change to "forget character, the only inportant thing is color"? Would he be all "God Damn America" and "Hate Whitey"?
I don't think so - I think he'd be more along side Bill Cosby, you know, a little personal responsibility to go along with the societal responsibility.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 11:26am):
Yes, but would Dr. King agree with Kyle that Iraqi terrorists have a "right" to kill American soldiers?
http://badgerherald.com/oped/2007/09/25/iraqi_insurgents_hav.php
Associating MLK with today's progressive hate-America movement is a slander of the man and his legacy.
Shame on you, Kyle.
Paul Courchane (April 16, 2008 @ 12:44pm):
Hey anonymous, don't go raining on Kyle's parade with crummy little "facts", it will break his little terrorist-supporting heart.
William Waller (April 16, 2008 @ 6:01pm):
Of course--only terrorists would violently oppose the persistent occupation of their nation by a foreign force! In fact, anybody who takes up arms against the United States military is a terrorist simply by default. Am I doing this knee-jerk nationalism thing right?
Not that the implied ad hominem is even remotely relevant to the subject of Dr. King. Great editorial, Kyle.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 6:16pm):
"Associating MLK with today's progressive hate-America movement is a slander of the man and his legacy.
Shame on you, Kyle."
Shame on you, anonymous, for not knowing more about history. Although, since you're busy using phrases like "hate-America", it would probably be a little much to expect you to understand the complex social issues of the 60's and 70's that motivated people like MLK. There's a big difference between hating one's country and being opposed to immoral policies.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 7:33pm):
When I opened the paper this morning, I thought to myself, people will make comments about three things which may or may not be directly related to the article: calling Kyle and minorities racist, calling Kyle a terrorist-supporter, and something about Israel. As I write this, there are only 3 comments posted, but I'm surprised that only 1 of those 3 has been said. Right-wing hacks, where you at?
Anonymous (April 17, 2008 @ 8:46am):
idiotarian @ 6:16pm yammered: "it would probably be a little much to expect you to understand the complex social issues of the 60's and 70's that motivated people like MLK."
Your smug condescensions are utterly non-persuasive. Neither you nor Kyle nor the entire progressive establishment can perform the rhetorical alchemy necessary to morph Dr. King into an icon of today's hate-America progressive movement.
Americans are quite familiar with Dr. King's civil rights marches and they bear ZERO resemblance to today's hate-America progressive gutter rioters.
http://www.zombietime.com/hall_of_shame
Show some intellectual honesty and stop trying legitimate the illegitimate by slandering Dr. King as a Marxist radical.
Show some intellectual honesty and take ownership of your mass murderer icon, Che.
Anonymous (April 17, 2008 @ 9:07am):
idiotarian @ 7:33pm predicted: "calling Kyle a terrorist-supporter"
That prediction isn't exactly rocket science. Kyle identified himself as a terrorist-supporter when he advocated the terrorists' "right" to kill American soldiers.
http://badgerherald.com/oped/2007/09/25/iraqi_insurgents_hav.php
Kyle will be constantly reminded of his calumny until he issues a formal public apology to the men and women of our armed forces and submits his resignation letter to the Badger Herald.
Shame on you idiotarians who offer aid and comfort to terrorist-sympathizers.
/quod idiocy demonstrandum
Add a comment
We welcome your thoughts, but please keep your feedback thoughtful, on-topic and respectful. Offensive language, personal attacks, or irrelevant comments may be deleted.
Login...
Not registered? Sign up now.
It's quick, free, and the email address you provide will not be sold or solicited.
