"Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers."
From his Nobel Lecture, 1964
"This I believe to be the privilege and the burden of all of us who deem ourselves bound by allegiances and loyalties which are broader and deeper than nationalism and which go beyond our nation's self-defined goals and positions. We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for victims of our nation and for those it calls enemy, for no document from human hands can make these humans any less our brothers."
From his 1967 speech "Beyond Vietnam"
4 comments:
It's that "loyalties . . . deeper than nationalism" part that gets me every time. Too many people refuse to even attempt to understand loyalties deeper than nationalism. Thanks for the reminder.
It's ironic that by the end of his life King was being dismissed as too soft, too moderate. His rhetoric on war and poverty was truly radical. You can bet Obama won't say anything as uncompromising, tomorrow or ever.
I'm old enough to remember when King was killed. We were living in the D.C. metro area at the time. I think I was 7 or 8. A scary, sad time.
Dave was, too, Mary--his dad was working in the city, and he remembers how crazy things got.
There's a great new book out about the riots, Clay Risen's "A Nation on Fire." I'm going to blog about it later this week.
Post a Comment