The Martin Luther King we never knew

The cross was an instrument of state torture employed as an instrument of terror which was required if imperialism was to conquer and then endure. In the life of Martin Luther King we see the power of this understanding as revealed in the evolution of a Christian minister who understood the significance of challenging power rather than preaching about ‘original sin'.

It is a sad fact that the truth about Martin Luther King is so poorly understood by most people. To most, he was a great civil rights leader, and he is remembered for seeking equality within the existing social order for black Americans. It is then believed that he was killed by racists. The truth is that Martin Luther King was an activist against Capitalism, and was working to transform America into a socialist state. He was murdered just before he launched his next great march on Washington, which he referred to as the march of the poor and the oppressed, and the marchers he was organizing were both black and white, who were impoverished and unemployed. As he understood, poverty is no accident, but rather is a deliberate creation of the capitalist system (the so called ‘ideal unemployment rate', which dooms millions to deliberate enforced poverty in order to keep down wage pressures, and protect the fortunes of capitalists). As King stated, condeming the ‘donations model' which reactionaries are always found to peddle as a form of ‘social justice' (because it does not challenge the system of oppression that creates poverty in the first place)

"True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring."

He also preached that the imperialism and militarism which were responsible for that form of armed robbery which created the third world was inextricably linked to the problems faced in America, and thus he began to develop a global perspective, which was ahead of its time, especially now that we consider that capitalist ‘globalization', and the exploitation of the third world, has almost completely destroyed the economic base of America, leaving the country limping along with an enormous trade imbalance that cannot be maintained forever, with the undermining of the job base leading to a drop in demand that inevitably will lead to another one of those periodic economic crashes which are a recurring feature of ‘free market' capitalism. He understood that the attacks launched against the poorest nations in the world by Washington were in the service of imperialism, and he condemned Washington as "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." This criticism was also prescient since we know that imperialist violence is the precursor to that backlash phenomena known as terrorism, and I think it is just remarkable that so much time has gone by and so much violence has been done to the planet by Washington, and it took so long for terrorism to come to America (which indicates that most of the people of the world understand that there exists a difference between the powerful, who are violent, and the people, who are deceived or kept in ignorance about what is really going on...)

King was murdered shortly before he could use his national prestige to bring these issues to the attention of the American people through his tactic of mounting another massive march on Washington, this time targeting American foreign policy and capitalism. It is understandable that his surviving family do no accept the official government explanation of his murder, and feel that a conspiracy was involved in this coincidental and conveniently timed death. (King was aware he was about to be assassinated, as is indicated by his last speech the day before he was gunned down).

It doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

King on Capitalism

If we are to achieve a real equalitythe U.S. will have toadopt a modified form of socialism.

The problem of racism, the problem of exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated.

Your whole structure must be changed. A nation that will keep people in slavery for 244 years will thingify them -- make them things. Therefore they will exploit them, and poor people generally, economically. And a nation that will exploit economically will have foreign investments and everything else, and will ahve to use its military to protect them. All of these problems are tied together.

What I am saying today is that we must go from this convention and say, America, you must be born again!

In the thinking of that day, the absence of worldly goods indicated a want of industrious habits and moral fiber. We've come a long way in our understanding of human motivation and of the blind operation of our economic system. Now we realize that dislocations in the market operations of our economy and the prevalence of discrimination thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will.

He is deprived of normal educationand normal social and economicopportunities. When he seeks opportunities,he is told, in effect, to lifthimself up by his own bootstraps,advice which does not take intoaccount the fact that he is barefoot.

If our nation can spend thirty-five billion dollars a year to fight an unjust, evil war in Vietnam, and twenty billion dollars to put a man on the moon, it can spend billions of dollars to put God's children on their own two feet right here on earth.

The movement must address itself to the question of restructuring the whole of American society. There are forty million poor people here. And one day we must ask the question, Why are there forty million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I'm simply saying that more and more, we've got to begin to ask questions about the whole society. We are called upon to help the discouraged beggars in life's marketplace. But one day we must come to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. It means that questions must be raised. You see, my friends, when you deal with this, you begin to ask the question, Who owns the oil? You begin to ask the question, Who owns the iron ore? You begin to ask the question, Why is it that people have to pay water bills in a world that is two-thirds water? These are questions that must be asked.

We must rapidly begin the shift froma ‘thing'-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machinesand computers, profit motives andproperty rights, are considered moreimportant than people, the gianttriplets of racism, materialism andmilitarism are incapable of beingconquered.

The dispossessed of this country the poor, the white and Negro livein a cruelly unjust society. they mustorganize a revolution against thatinjustice, not against the lives of thepersons who are their fellow citizens,but against the structures throughwhich society is refusing to takemeans which have been called for,and which are at hand, to lift the loadof poverty.

We have a task and let us go out with a divine dissatisfaction. Let us be dissatisfied until America will no longer have a high blood pressure of creeds and an anemia of deeds. Let us be dissatisfied until the tragic walls that separate the outer city of wealth and comfort and the inner city of poverty and despair shall be crushed by the battering rams of the forces of justice.

The Vietnam War

Reading Martin Luther King on Vietnam really highlights what seems to be the collapse and decline of dissent in America, in particular any form of dissent from the pulpit (although, to be fair, given the censorship and oppression in American society, it would be hard to know for sure if there are any preachers of any caliber to still be found in America...certainly the prominent are found to be quite small and insignificant when you compare them with the really powerful sermons preached by a revolutionary minister like Martin Luther King. Speaking of his fellow ministers, King said,

So often, preachers aren't concerned about anything but themselves. And I'm always happy to see a relevant ministry.It's all right to talk about "long white robes over yonder," in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here. It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preachers must talk about the New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do.

The following is taken from King's famous speech condemning the war in Vietnam, and this remains one of King's most timely speeches, given the current situation in Iraq. It is clear that the act of aggression against Vietnam, which King said put the United States on the wrong side of growing moves toward world revolution, as an oppressor, rather than a liberator, further radicalized King's views, and it is evident that as time went on he was moving towards greater revolutionary thinking and increasing radicalism, all of which was cut short before he could deliver his greatest challenge to the system, which is tragic, when you consider the price America is now paying for its continued ignorance (truly the loss of Martin Luther King cost the nation dearly at the end of it all, since no one of his caliber appeared since that time to lead his people out of the wilderness, and ‘into the promised land').

I speak now because I agree with Dante, that the hottest place in hell is reserved for those that, in a time of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.

I see this war as an unjust, evil and futile war. I preach to you today on the war in Vietnam because my conscience leaves me with no other choice. The time has come for America to hear the truth about this tragic war. In international conflicts the truth is hard to come by, because most nations are deceived about themselves. Rationalizations and the incessant search for scapegoats are the psychological cataracts that blind us to our sins.

America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such.

one of the difficulties in speaking out today grows out of the fact that there are those who are seeking to equate dissent with disloyalty. It is a dark day in our nation when high level authorities will seek to use every method to silence dissent. Something has happened and people are not going to be silent, the truth must be told. Yes we must stand, and we must speak. There comes a time when silence is betrayal.

As I have walked among the desperate, rejected and angry young men I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems.

I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But they asked -- and rightly so -- what about Vietnam? They asked if our own nation wasn't using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted.

Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent.

These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression and out of the wombs of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as never before. "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light."

Now let me tell you the truth about it, they must see Americans as strange liberators...They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their crops. They must weep as the bulldozers roar through their areas preparing to destroy the precious trees. ..We have destroyed their two most cherished institutions: the family and the village. We have destroyed their land and their crops. This is the role our nation has taken.

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies...we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more that flinging a coin to a beggar. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation.

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