MLK: A Dream Misinterpreted

I’ve been going through a lot lately because many things in my life are changing. I start my first full-time, post-grad school position tomorrow morning, in a few months I will be moving into a new apartment, and I’m four months into a relationship. I’ve been thinking a lot about change, how we deal with it, and sometimes, how we resist it. With the economic downturn came major change in all aspects of our society. I’ve realized through my struggles, my loved ones’ struggles and the struggles of the global community that real change requires healing. Martin Luther King’s dream was not so much about achieving equality for blacks as it was about healing taking place in society at large.

Many of the times I’ve heard his August 1963 speech quoted, the focus has remained black and white. People tend to zone in on the injustices that were being committed. Most frequently, the words describing a time when skin color would not matter are the only words remembered. However, that speech was much longer than the few sentences that are typically repeated as one addresses the issue of racism. In revisiting the speech, I see that the picture Martin Luther King painted describes an end result. The scenes are the pinnacles of the movement, not the beginning. We can’t start at the point where everyone has the same freedom. That grand finale can only take place when each person in society learns to forgive, allowing healing to occur.

Previous to all the statements that begin with “I have a dream…” King addresses blacks, warning them against gaining equality through wrong deeds. He tells them they must not allow themselves to be overcome by bitterness and hatred. He went out of his way to give this instruction in the understanding that the problems of the day were an outcome of wounds that had not healed. The hurts and pains had been passed from one generation to the other, and while blacks were no longer slaves they were still being treated as inferiors. Toward the end of the speech he mentions other groups of people that had historic wounds standing in the way of sincere mutual respect: Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics.

We’ve written anti-discrimination laws, offered minorities educational and vocational opportunities, and with the election of Barack Obama, now seen firsthand that there is no limit to a black person’s rank or success. Yet healing is not complete. There are still those that look down on the president because of his skin, that have contempt for those who can’t afford designer clothes, that harbor hatred for people only because they believe in Jesus. In celebration of Martin Luther King we should forgive those who have hurt us by devaluing us, and ask forgiveness of those we have hurt the same way. King’s dream will be a reality not when a laundry list of achievements for a certain race has been checked off, but when we all let go of our prejudices and see our neighbor as simply another human being just like ourselves. Leaving the mistakes and injustices in the past where they belong, healed from the things we’ve done to each other, we will finally do Martin Luther King justice.

-Vanessa is a blogger for The Sorbate. Check out her bio to see where her view comes from.

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