Martin Luther King Jr. and the Complicated Legacy of Our White Past

Last updated on: January 26, 2016 at 10:21 pm by Libby Anne

Martin Luther King Jr. and the Complicated Legacy of Our White Past 2016-01-26T22:21:40-04:00 Libby Anne

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Yesterday was Martin Luther King Jr. day. Yesterday was also the day I told my six-year-old daughter that her great-great-grandfather was a member of the Ku Klux Klan during the 1920s. Once she got it—I had to explain what the KKK was, after all—her response was one of utter horror. Or rather, one of horror mixed with bewilderment. “Why?” she asked. “Why?!” When I told her that her great-great-great grandmother used to boast that black people weren’t allowed in her county after sundown, her consternation only increased.

It’s easy, on a day like yesterday, to imagine racial discrimination as something remote and unrelated to ourselves, or families, or our heritages. After all, we would have been one of the good guys if we’d been alive back then! Right? Actually, for most white Americans, that’s a big fat no. If we’d lived back then we’d very likely have had the same sorts of prejudices our ancestors had.

And it’s not always that far away, either. One of my daughter’s great-grandparents continued to use the n-word until the day he died, and my husband remembers him complaining about the time a black family moved onto his block and ruined his housing value. Another of my daughter’s great-grandparents once told me they’d chosen to move to the neighborhood my mother grew up in because the schools in the next locale over were “violent” and “dangerous”—read black.

And of course, as we well know, the struggle isn’t over. If I had a nickel for every white American eager to lift Martin Luther King Jr. as a role model while simultaneously suggesting that Trayvon Martin, or Freddie Grey, or Laquan MacDonald likely deserved to get shot, I’d be rich. The struggle changes, but the battle lines remain the same. What these individuals fail to realize is that if they’d been alive half a century ago, they would have been among Martin Luther King Jr.’s detractors, not among his admirers.

In his famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail, penned in 1963, King took primary aim not at the KKK or white racists but rather at white moderates.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizens Councillor or the Ku Klux Klanner but the white moderate who is more devoted to order than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically feels that he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time; and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

Interestingly, King’s popularity with the public at large was on an upswing when he penned those words. Indeed, King made Gallup’s “Most Admired Man” list in 1964 and 1965. He did not make the list in 1966, however, and Gallup did not measure his popularity in 1967 or in 1968, the year he died.

1963: 41% positive and 37% negative

1964: 43% positive and 39% negative

1965: 45% positive and 45% negative

1966: 32% positive and 63% negative

Why did King’s popularity dip after 1965? Put simply, King made white people increasingly uncomfortable as time went on. The summer of 1965 saw riots in Los Angeles, and in early 1966 King turned his focus to housing segregation in Chicago. An increasing number of white Americans associated King with violence, and many in the North who praised him as he sought to address racism and segregation in the South turned on him when he brought the same message to the North.

Here’s an excerpt from Matt Pearce’s recent Los Angeles Times article, When Martin Luther King Jr. took his fight into the North, and saw a new level of hatred:

Fifty years ago this January, King embarked on a less-remembered chapter from the final years of his life, a battle that ultimately went unfinished — a campaign against poverty and de facto segregation in the North that was met with institutional resistance, skepticism from other activists and open violence.

“I have never seen, even in Mississippi and Alabama, mobs as hateful as I’ve seen here in Chicago,” King told reporters that day, stripping off his tie and vowing to continue demonstrating. “Yes, it’s definitely a closed society. We’re going to make it an open society.”

In the U.S. today, we celebrate a sanitized version of Martin Luther King, Jr., a version we can be comfortable with. We forget that had King been alive today, he would have stood alongside the protesters in Ferguson. We forget that King was not interested in making white people comfortable.

I told my daughter about her great-great-great grandparents because I wanted to push back against our willingness to see civil rights as something obvious, something that can almost be taken for granted. As white Americans, we need to see civil rights as something that will at times—and should—make us uncomfortable. With that in mind, we need to support civil rights when the movement is popular and when the going gets tough—and it will. That part of King’s legacy was likely under celebrated in Martin Luther King Jr. celebrations across white America yesterday.

But that wasn’t the end of my conversation with my daughter yesterday. I also told her that her great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother was a Quaker. I had to explain what that was too, of course, but once I did her eyes lit up. “Cool!” she said. We need to bring our children face to face with reality, but we also need to inspire them to be the ones willing to keep going when others stop.

Social Justice

martin luther king jr

race

Previous Post

January 18, 2016

Mary Lambert and the Ups and Downs of Being a Survivor

Next Post

January 20, 2016 Hitting the Reset Button

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Atheism Evangelicalism/Fundamentalism Family Feminism Homeschool Meta Parenting Patriarchy Politics Purity Quiverfull Social Justice Uncategorized Worthwhile reads

Select a Month February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What did the people do when Ezra read from the Book of the Law?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Destroyed idols Laughed Wept and repented Ran away