I might as well dedicate a whole month to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. King met with Elijah Muhammad in 1966. After that 1966 meeting, King started to sound even more radical in his tone and message. This is the Dr. King “they” killed. He started to demand reparations for blacks from America, he quoted a then 30 billion annual, black spending habit that needed to circulate in the black community longer, he spoke on black pride, he talked about boycotting corrupt and stingy paying corporations, and the redistribution of wealth to poor people of all races. By early 1967 he was criticizing the Vietnam War as well.
As Minister Louis Farrakhan said, King wasn’t killed because he had a dream, he was killed because he woke up from that dream. “They” had from late 1955- Dr. King’s Montgomery bus boycott public arrival- until 1966 and 1967 to kill him. Within two years of his relative radical leader transformation in 1966 and one year of his Vietnam War critique in 1967, “they” assassinated him- April 4, 1968.
Dr. King took us from blatant and frequent racism of the past to subtle and sporadic racism of today. He also took us from de jure segregation (formal-enforced by institutional law) of the past to de facto segregation (informal-caused by individual preference of today.) He got us in the door. Now It’s up to us to elevate black progress to the next level by following Malcolm and Marcus Garvey’s message of controlling the politics of some our de facto segregated communities, building institutions, corporations, economic powerhouses, and de facto nation building as a buffer against present day subtle and sporadic racism. Dr. King was speaking on economics in his later years as well.
But in the mean time, I’m not falling for the kumbaya white- washed image of Dr. King by the mainstream media, or the cynical downplay of his positive influence by some elements of the conscious community against Dr. King. Big salute to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
