Misrepresenting MLK

One of these yearswe’re going to get through an MLK holiday without the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s message being misappropriated.

Two recent examples:

First, the Seattle Seahawks, in the aftermath of their Green Bay gift-wrapped, come-from-behind win over the Packers, sent out a celebratory twitter message that said “We shall overcome.” It was accompanied by a photo of their emotional quarterback Russell Wilson next to the King quote and the hashtag MLKDay. At best, poor form.

Upon further review, the Seahawks organization apologized for blatantly trivializing King’s message of working non-violently toward an equal, racially unpolarized America where “content of character” mattered most. It sounded contrite, but it’s what you would expect from professional PR damage control.

Second, amid the myriad MLK Day parades, including local versions, there were literal signs of contemporary, societal issues that underscore this country’s ongoing racial crucible. Totally appropriate for a nation that still falls far short of King’s dream. But too many of these signs, some carried by little children used as props, read: “No justice, no peace.”

That’s not trivializing King; that’s flat-out misrepresenting him.

The civil rights martyr who said “Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can drive out hate” was not advocating extortion and eye-for-an-eye payback if America didn’t mend its racist ways. Dr. King, as we all (should) know, was in the non-violent, civil-disobedience tradition of Henry David Thoreau and Mahatma Gandhi–not Malcolm X or H. Rap Brown. “We shall overcome” isn’t code for “By any means necessary or “Burn, baby, burn.”

When we finally see that Dr. King’s message is no longer being trivialized as a sports cliché or misrepresented for various racial agendas, we will know we have, indeed, overcome.

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