zlacker

>>david9+(OP)
But we have to make an effort in the United States. We have to make an effort to understand, to get beyond, or go beyond these rather difficult times.

My favorite poem, my -- my favorite poet was Aeschylus. And he once wrote:

"Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God."

What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country ...

We can do well in this country. We will have difficult times. We've had difficult times in the past -- and we will have difficult times in the future. It is not the end of violence; it is not the end of lawlessness; and it's not the end of disorder.

But the vast majority of [people] in this country want to live together, want to improve the quality of our life, and want justice for all human beings that abide in our land.

And let's dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world. Let us dedicate ourselves to that, and say a prayer for our country and for our people.

Bobby Kennedy, 1968

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2kWIa8wSC0

>>themgt+Rx
While I like that quote, i just went to lookup the speach and was sadden to learn you “sanitized” it. Taking out the phrase “vast majority of white people and vast majority of black people”

That too says something about our times. Maybe a few things. From being unable to trust things without verifying, to people’s willingness to alter the truth to make a point, to how people fear discussing race and gender loud even in passing.

>>Abstra+D72
And the "those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black" which has always stuck in my mind because of the iconic phrasing.

Frankly I find creating an analogue between the death of MLK and Kirk in bad taste only magnified by scrubbing race from an MLK tribute.

Kirk would have celebrated MLK's death as he did the Pelosi hammer attack. Kirk called MLK "awful" and "not a good person" and the Civil Rights Movement "a huge mistake.".

https://www.wired.com/story/charlie-kirk-tpusa-mlk-civil-rig...

>>Fluore+bB2
Removing the black and white people part makes it more relevant to the current times when it is not just black and white people but non negligible numbers of Hispanics, first peoples, Asians, Arabs and other minorities.

>>fawkes+aR2
There were non-negligible numbers of those people in MLK, Jr’s time, too. That has nothing to do with why he talked about white and black.

EDIT: It’s particularly funny to imagine that First peoples somehow only became a thing in America sometime after Dr. King’s time.

>>dragon+zR2
But advocating for the struggles of one group and not another shouldn’t make one bad.

The whole idea of intersectionality makes it hard to build coalitions and turns everything into a problem that’s impossibly complex to solve and difficult to build a coalition around.

It’s the basic reason many leaders who the majority of a country dislike rise to power. Because that majority can’t put their differences aside.