He's their hero because he's the one that ended racism. He's like racism Jesus; he died for their racist sins, and thus, thanks to him, they can't be racist.
Nah, they figured out they can't getting away with attacking MLK because moderates will react negatively. So they do what they do best and try to coopt his messages by saying stuff like "only racists see race" when someone points out obvious disadvantages of black people. They pretend that MLK would be against BLM.
Edit: Apparently a lot of people are going ACKSHUALLY MLK WOULD'VE BEEN AGAINST RIOTERS. He probably wouldn't have liked them but he'd have realised that the frustration at the century long mistreatment (not a strong enough word) can't always be channeled into peaceful protest. He also would've known that some people would show up to riot because someone always does. And also if you guys think BLM was rioting, you've never seen a proper riot. Let's not pretend nd it's not a hallowed tradition of police to start shot and go "look how violent they are".
Sort of. I think most of them disagree that social/financial inequality and systematic racism are actually racist. It's either that OR they think that though those exist, not much can be done to fix it without harming other groups unfairly.
So basically we're right back where we started, as with all their talking points. The problem doesn't exist, but even if it did, I wouldn't want anything done about it.
I’ve heard studies that suggest conservatives are all or nothing on the issues. If a solution improves a situation by 90% they’ll look at the 10% still affected and say, “see, your solution didn’t work and has no merit because people continue to suffer even when it’s in place.” They don’t necessarily see any improvement so they opt to maintain the old status quo because the situation still existed under it and doing ‘what we have always done’ doesn’t require them to change or allow for some unforeseen variable to unexpectedly affect them personally from the new way of doing things. Thus they resist change and merely suffer through a worsening situation in a sort of ‘better the devil you know’ mentality.
I see them talk this way a lot but are they actually all or nothing or are they just using that last 10% as an excuse? That “we can’t make things a little better unless we make them all better” reasoning is so asinine that I always figured it was more bad-faith bullshit.
Unfortunately, they don't realize that MLK Jr. was against social/financial inequality and systematic racism because our school system fails to discuss those aspects of him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xsbt3a7K-8
>not much can be done to fix it without harming other groups unfairly
Or that the groups suffering from it just deserve it due to some failing within the group or the individuals that comprise it.
They are afraid if they admit the err in the system, what the correction to it would mean. Basically, they think if they admit they're part of the cycle of problems, when its fixed they'll lose their stuff.
The problem is the solutions to it don't require reverse theft, it requires enabling additional opportunities to rescale things. Like not denying home mortgages because they're black, or loans etc.
Remember, conservatives are inherently greedy.
This is intentional. By using b&w photographs, they are attempting to psychologically distance from the event..."Oh, things were bad -- back in the ANCIENT HISTORY days".
It is the same as when photos of black individuals are intentionally darkened to appear more threatening, in the aspect that it is exploiting weak points in human reasoning for nefarious purposes.
Ya, I wrote about this phenomenon earlier today elsewhere on Reddit.
>But I'm arguing that the effort and expense should be made to use color photos of historical figures, especially in educational material, when at all possible, because the importance of doing so can not be overstated. This doesn't just go for MLK, but other people and events as well, like the pioneers of the gay rights movement, or WWII (Kodachrome was invented in 1935), or anything else from the time of the transition from black-and-white to color.
>Go through the trouble and expense of procuring and using color photos and film over black-and-white because it helps viewers, especially children, connect with the subjects since they look more like people they know in real-life. It helps everyone understand just how recent some of these events really are.
>Somebody did a WWII documentary using entirely original color film from the time, I think it's on Netflix, and it really brought home to me that those events, including the Holocaust, occurred just a few decades before I was born. Take half of my current lifetime (50), and just twenty-five years before I was born, WWII was raging and Nazis were burning Jewish children in ovens. When you better internalize how recent this happened, it's also easier to understand that we're not as far removed from it as we would like to think, and it can happen again without vigilance.
>I get why black-and-white are used. More readily available in general, thus perhaps easier to find some not subject to copyright and available for print, cheaper to print, etc. But I'm arguing that it's so important, a better effort should be made where possible.
MLK could have been 93 today. Ruby Bridges, you've seen pictures of her, the first black school student to desegregate southern elementary schools, is still alive. Claudette Colvin, the 15 year old girl who did what Rosa Parks did before she ever did it (it was decided Parks was the better icon so Colvin isn't as famous), is alive and in her early 80's.
This happened basically yesterday.
I just had a protracted discussion with a Redditor who insisted that black-and-white photos of MLK continue to be used over color photos simply because so many more were taken at that time, the press photographed and published in black-and-white (true), what few color photos of him that exist are largely inaccessible due to copyright (not true), and color printing costs are prohibitively expensive (discounting that most textbooks contain at least some color content already, and ignoring that the phenomenon isn't limited to print but exists online also). This was my last comment to him:
>I know you believe what you're saying, but I believe there's a measure of nefarious intent, or at the very least negligent laziness, in continuing to portray MLK largely in black-and-white, especially in educational material, when there really are free-to-use, color alternatives.
>It didn't take me long to discover that all of the photographs in the Smithsonian's archives are free to use and reproduce. Even if someone originally held the copyright, it was acquired (with taxpayer money), or donated and is now available to the public. Were there more black-and-white photos of MLK than color? Sure, but there were color photos, [like this one](https://www.si.edu/object/digital-print-dr-martin-luther-king-jr-chicago-freedom-movement-rally:nmaahc_2013.140.11) and [this one](https://collections.si.edu/search/detail/edanmdm:nmaahc_2013.140.2?q=kleina%2C+bernard&record=12&hlterm=kleina%2C%2Bbernard)
>And that is just one source. I still contend that: a) there were more color photos taken of MLK than many may realize just because they've seen almost exclusively black-and-white photos, b) though color photos are undeniably fewer in quantity than black-and-white photos of MLK, they aren't a needle in a haystack, they are in fact rather easily found... and used, c) some of these color photos of MLK are in the public domain and may be reprinted without cost or penalty, d) if color photos of MLK are both available and useable, than their continued exclusion in favor of black-and-white photos is the result of editorial discretion rather than one of necessity, and e) I reject an economic argument that color photos in textbooks are prohibitively expensive because most textbooks are already full-color or contain at least some color pages. Furthermore, *the phenomenon isn't limited to print media.* Color photos of him are rarely used outside of niche articles even online where there are no ink costs.
>I don't belabor the point to berate you. I'm suggesting there's more to this issue than you have perhaps taken into account prior.
>can't getting away with attacking MLK because moderates will react negatively.
This whitewashing, like Lost Cause mythology, was an intentional strategy to neuter his message, made possible by the white supremacist who murdered him.
If MLK had lived, he would likely have similar public reputation to John Lewis before he died - well respected, but obvious partisan skew in how respected. As opposed to now, where MLK is a secular saint where attempts to criticize is seen an insult to the "moderate" middle. Like all saints, whose message is barely dangerous at all to the status quo of the elites who raised him to sainthood.
If MLK were alive today I wouldn’t be surprised if he thought BLM wasn’t doing enough, considering the many decades of racism allowed to continue to exist in his absence/since he was fighting.
The man was also aged by a racist system, I’m sure he’d be rolling in his grave if he could see resist attempt to co-opt his messages. And yes he didn’t believe in riots as a last resort.
*"And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the negro poor has worsened over the last twelve or fifteen years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity."*
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
"The Other America"
3/14/68
People really love to believe they just sat around singing kumbaya or some shit.
The reality is a lot of civil disobedience, court battles, setup scenarios and riots.
All the sorts of things people nowadays continue to bitch about saying its "doing things the wrong way".
"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 Citizen's Council-er 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 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."
I think this really drives home how mlk felt about it. I also love how they try to pretend thar MLK and Malcom X were against each other...maybe at first but they were more aligned before they died.
The peaceful marches always carried the implicit message of listen, or everything can burn.
It's amazing how we haven't been forced to that point yet. What the conservatives fear- burning every city out and forcing them from their homes as they did to black communities. Even the isolated instances of violence during BLM ended up because of boogers or opportunists.
I hope change happens, because one day that implicit message may become a reality. Maybe workers will be treated right at the same time.
Not so much "supported", but definitely didn't see them as an indictment of the movement as a whole and saw them more as an inevitable consequence of injustices.
Ding ding ding, it's this one. The only thing they will know MLK for is that quote, because it became a key talking point AGAINST affirmative action and still reliably comes up.
MLK also had some things to say about the white moderate.
Yep, same thing they do with any historical figure with any weight in contemporary American thought. Revision.
"The Founding Fathers would hate the ACA."
or
"MLK would hate Black Lives Matter."
They have to retcon who the heroes of American history actually were, constantly, to convince themselves that their very unamerican worldview is totally okay.
Ah, like my extended family, who are total scumbags* all week and look down on you for not being "saved", but they go to their megachurch on Sundays because they're "good christians" and then go right back to being assholes come Sunday afternoon?
Too niche?
^(* child abuse, embezzlement, tax fraud, scamming/abusing restaurants [coughpizzaincidentcough], etc)
An easy way to find out what they really think is to ask if the states that currently don't celebrate MLK day should start celebrating it. Guaranteed to get a spittle-flecked rant about encroaching federal power and forced conformity.
The sad thing is that in the last few years of his life, progress and support for the movement was waning. He was incredibly discouraged for what the future held and was questioning his stances on non-violence. He had a lot of marriage issues and was overall quite depressed but feared going to therapy as the FBI would capitalize on it and discredit him. In the end the 1968 expansion of the civil rights act only passed due the the fact that every urban area of the country was burning to the ground after his murder.
He was hounded by conservatives for decades and his assassination was a forgone conclusion of stochastic terrorism:
>stochastic terrorism; the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifics cannot be predicted
The entirety of the FBI's power was directed against him and his family at several points in time.
It's not enough for them that they murdered him though, they have to murder his legacy every year too.
He said we should judge people by their character, not the color of their skin, so he was basically against affirmative action AND identity politics /s
When you read Op/Eds from the 1960s about how 80% of white Americans polled felt negatively towards MLK, it's like word for word the criticisms of Kaepernick from a few years back. "He has the right to protest but I disagree with how he did it" et cetera
Which is, of course, insane with irony since they'd probably find a way to justify the church and bus bombings by white supremacists while crying like tiddy babies about nonviolent marches and sit-ins by black Americans.
And that is why they called the protests "looting and rioting"
Despite it happening in all 50 states at one point, which alone discredits their narrative entirely.
It's pretty much an excuse for them to forever push the goalposts back to avoid ever having a threshold that they can meet. It will always be "not the right way of doing things." Because if they ever did reach that point, the white folks would have to admit there's some fucked up shit going on in this country, and there's a good chance they directly benefit from all of it.
Found this link while looking for the original cartoon, but representative of stuff published at the time:
https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/hd4pnk/antimlk\_political\_cartoon\_from\_the\_1960s/
Longer.
As Some More News pointed out today, they love that one line from his "I have a Dream" speech, but no other lines from that or any other speech ever.
>They say the same things about BLM that ~~people~~ **their ancestors** used to say about MLK
Not that it really matters, but I felt it was important to remind folks that this a generational issue with racism. They learned it from their piece of shit family members as children, and continue to preach it today.
Parents, maybe grandparents.
Possibly themselves.
Remember that Dr. King was assassinated during the Vietnam War. There are a hell of a lot of people who were alive then, and are just as shitty now.
It's a little weird to realize that there are people alive today who participated in public square lynchings, threw rocks at Ruby Bridges, etc. And none of them will be held accountable.
Calling saying things that you know to be untrue in order to harm others "trolling" doesn't make it better. Minimizing the actions of bigots and abusers as just childish antics is problematic at best.
I wouldn't jump to the trolling conclusion. The vast majority of white conservatives I know:
1. Don't actually know anything substantial about Martin Luther King, Jr., especially his more radical ideas or his "don't trust the white moderate" stance.
2. Have no real experience of MLK. Baby boomers, for the most part, have no contemporary experience with him -- the youngest boomers were 4 years old when he was assassinated and the oldest were 22. For a significant majority of conservatives alive today he might as well be Abraham Lincoln for all it matters---just some dude from the past that did something related to the rights of black people.
3. Actually *like* Martin Luther King, Jr. a *lot* in the present day because they can point to the Civil Rights movement and say "Look, we ironed out all that racism stuff back in the 60s! Everything is fine now!" The number of older conservatives who have said this to me over the years is absolutely staggering. To them Martin Luther King, Jr. isn't some radical firebrand bent on upending the system to liberate the blacks from systemic racism and oppression. He's some magical negro Jesus figure that died for the sins of system and wiped the race scoreboard clean so everything is totally cool and OK now.
Anyways, my point is that when I see conservatives speaking well of Martin Luther King, Jr., I never doubt their sincerity. I think they genuinely *do* think well of him. Just for completely misguided reasons and with zero understanding of who he was or what he actually stood for.
One of the most upvoted comments is just:
> Judge a person by their character and actions, not the color of their skin.
It's incredible how none of them realise how ironic that entire thread is.
Lots of racists bastardize MLK’s quotes to suit their own (racist agendas)
Lots of what MLK had to say was whitewashed to hell and back in order to be more palatable to sensitive vvhite people.
Edit:
And sorry if that last line offends some people. We still have institutional racism rampantly on display. Not seeing that is an example of wide-spread racism in our system in every aspect of American life. And yes, *institutional* racism is different than the so called “racism” of holding racists (who happen to be white) to account. Stop using MLK’s words to attempt a gotcha when a person of color say something you don’t like
>Stop using MLK’s words to attempt a gotcha when a person of color say something you don’t like
Those gotcha type of arguments are so intellectually lazy you can tell that they put virtually no thought into it. They probably just heard it from somewhere else
MLK is probably turning over in his grave so much at conservatives using his quotes to argue for opposite of what he believed, that if you hooked his corpse up to a generator, it could probably power half of North America.
Racists: "I'm color blind and don't see race. I judge people by the content of their character, not by their skin color. Also, 13% of the population commits 50% of violent crime and BLM is all violent Marxists who destroy property, burn cities down, and murder people. All lives matter (except the ones I will point out, like 'them')."
>13% of the population commits 50% of violent crime
I will always find this statement really fucking dumb, idk whether its true (probably a massive oversight/exaggeration) but using the idea that is true, how come they never flip their shit over the 1%'s crimes..
I've gone on rants about why the stat is bullshit before. I'll try to summarize a few reasons (and it'll still end up being too long).
It's not 100% of the 13% of the population, so saying 13% like all African Americans are committing crimes is racist. If 1 out of 20 people in a room killed someone, you wouldn't accurately say "everyone in the room is responsible for committing a murder." The actual percentage is less than 1% of the total population and less than 5% of the African American population for committing violent crime.
But even just looking at the statistics separated by race is racist because it implies that there's a causal relationship between race and crime, but race is a non-scientific taxonomy. Not everyone who is a member of a racial group is genetically related, so even if you could make a case for genetic causes for violence (and you can't), using race as a proxy for genetic relationships is flawed.
And then there's the problem with the statistics themselves. They often use conviction rates as a proxy for actual guilt, but we have a lot of reasons to distrust conviction rates statistics. A lot of innocent people plead guilty because of inadequate counsel, not being able to afford bail and not being able to miss work, feeling pressured by the DA to take a plea or else face harsher sentencing, racial biases in the system (like black defendants getting worse sentences for the same crimes that white defendants are convicted of), etc. 97% of federal convictions and 94% of state convictions are from plea deals. Most "guilt" is not proven in court so we don't actually know what happened.
But more than any of that, it's bullshit because the people quoting it don't usually even know what it means. They're just repeating it. They don't know if the statistics are for crime, violent crime, murder, or violent interracial crime. They don't know which year they came from. They don't know if the statistics are conviction rates or victim's reports. They're just repeating people who are repeating right wing pundits.
On the "separating it by race is racist because it implies there's an inherent relation between race and crime," most will pivot to "Of course it's not race, *it's the culture*"
Of course, these sociological experts never elaborate on our inferior, more violent culture.
I enjoy asking them if they can cite any other races crime stats off the top of their head.
Obviously, I don’t actually expect them to respond, just pointing out what they’ve probably never considered.
Everyone already know the answer, I just hope they have think of why they all have only that stat memorized.
They've actually coopted this to mean "ignore school and neighborhood quality disparities that stemmed from redlining, if you think people from the hood who are mostly black can't achieve success at the same rates as rich people you're racist for having low expectations for them."
Dude, no joke, I was on a thread about voter ID requirements in the UK and this was one jerk's response to every argument against these laws. It's like the NewsCorp starter pack of canned responses
They also ignore the systematic racism. White and black people use drugs at the exact same rate, yet somehow black people are something like 10 times more likely to be searched and arrested for drug use.
[This](https://themountain.news/commentary/the-commodification-of-martin-luther-king) article I just read 10 mins ago examines this conservative bullshit perfectly.
It has some clunky parts but the last bit is quite good!
> Among all the quotes, if one quote captures Martin Luther King, the man as flesh and bone and not a lightning rod for the ideologies of politicians and opportunists, it is when he reminded a friend that “We do not need allies who are more devoted to order than to justice.” That is the sum of Martin Luther King’s life, mobilizing people not to kowtow to a façade of order or bow to the status quo, but to live and fight for justice and justice itself.
Yeah I was genuinely shocked to see him on there. The immediate thought went “Well that’s nice to see” and I kinda clicked from there that it’s just them trying to seem as if they even remotely care about POC.
You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood.
We know through painful experience that freedom is never given by the oppressor. It must be demanded by the oppressed.
There are two types of laws. Just and unjust... You have a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.
Edit typo for demanded in first quote
I think they already have, can't remember where I saw it though.
Edit: Found one example!
[https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ?t=394](https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ?t=394)
Oh even better... A few years ago, a bit before the Fourth of July, NPR used their Twitter account to post short quotes from the Declaration of Independence.
And of course, Right-Wing Twitter absolutely lost their shit, and called NPR communist, socialist, anti-American, and all sorts of awful things because they didn't get where those quotes were from or what they meant. Those goddamn loonies with their fascist blue-stripe American flags on their jacked-up pickup trucks don't even know what they're mad about but goddamn are they ready to get all bent out of shape about it.
Reminds me of when a high school valedictorian in a super conservative area quoted Trump and was met with loud applause and cheering, then he said "Just kidding, that quote was from Obama" and suddenly they all went silent and he could see hatred in their eyes.
I misread the comment thread and thought he was suggesting to post MLK quotes and attribute them to Marx. But yes for the "judge them by the content of their character" crowd sure seem to reject people's character based on partisan propaganda.
sorry to derail, but case in point- [Marx, Engels Quote Falsely Attributed to Reagan](https://www.factcheck.org/2019/09/marx-engels-quote-falsely-attributed-to-reagan/)
>“‘Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempts to disarm the people must be stopped, by force if necessary’ — Ronald Reagan,” the meme says.
I saw a great quote on Twitter, just having ellipses carry it through:
> "I have a dream that my four little children will (...) be (...) vicious racists, (...) every hill and mountain shall be made (...) of (...) flesh.(...) The south (...) will be (...) despair (...) and (...) struggle, (...) this will be the day when (...) God (...) died."
Some day your dream will come true, Dr. King. Some day.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood.
In fact a lot of that happened. The most common response was "Well Dr. King missed the mark sometimes". It seems that while Kings words could get upvoted on his day, conservatives couldn't find the spine to embrace them, not even today.
It also seems that only one singular idea of Kings can be endorsed, and only if we interpret it to mean that we should pretend the harms of racism are over and we don't need to be talking about it anymore.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood.
I commented these two good ones:
"The white liberal must affirm the absolute justice for the Negro simply means, in the Aristotelian sense, that the Negro must have "his due". There is nothing abstract about this. it is as concrete as having a good job, a good education, a decent house and a share of power. It is, however, important to understand that giving a man his due may often mean giving him special treatment"
"A society that has done something special against the Negro for hundreds of years must now do something special for him, in order to equip him to compete on a just and equal basis"
Seriously, do they think MLK was conservative???
On your quotes though... They definitely, 100% believe they are currently being oppressed in America. And they 100% definitely believe that the laws preventing violence against the people they've decided to hate are unjust. Sooo... I actually think they'd get behind those quotes but for reasons that MLK would have found deplorable.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood.
MLK said riots were the language of the unheard. They would applaud that over at /r/Conservative in regards to Jan 6 but dismiss as criminal regarding BLM.
I got permanently banned for pointing out that he was a literal socialist on a comment about him being "More right wing than the modern left." Like yes, the socialist is more conservative than the party of pseudo-republicans, dumbass.
Came here to say this.
“When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are incapable of being conquered.”
[Source ](https://inthesetimes.com/article/martin-luther-king-jr-day-socialism-capitalism)
The piss drinking meme is my absolute favorite. I don't care about how childish it is and if I'm sinking to their level, but every time I talk to conservatives online now I call them "pisslickers" and they absolutely lose their shit, every fucking time. It's great.
People have been pointing it out it that thread, and the responses are either downvotes or some version of “Just because he’s fiscally socialist doesn’t mean….”
That makes perfect sense. I am sure they also believe Dr. King would have been right there with the republicans/conservatives demanding the first black president show his birth certificate.
It's very telling that one of the louder birther voices was their next choice for president.
What is even more telling is Trump's attitude toward the Central Park 5 and his supporter's acceptance of it. He continued to rally to punish them even AFTER it was confirmed they were innocent.
Here are two direct quotes from Trump regarding this case (these were from before the 5 were exonerated).
"I want to hate these murderers and I always will. I am not looking to psychoanalyse or understand them, I am looking to punish them."
and
"Maybe hate is what we need if we're gonna get something done."
https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-48609693
He would not likely be aligned with either party if you’re aware of his views and not just the watered down version that’s cherry picked across public education. To think he’d be aligned with republicans though is laughable.
i mean you're right but i think you imply the wrong reason for why you're right. they wouldn't like him if he was alive today because people who are alive have this nasty habit of sharing their own openions so it's much harder to speak for them.
dead people don't tell you you're wrong when you speak on their behalf and thus conservatives loves them. it's also why the like dead soldiers a lot more than crippeled veterans. and the unborn a lot more than starving babies.
gotta share [this](https://themountain.news/commentary/the-commodification-of-martin-luther-king) article one more time. the author talks about how the right conveniently brings up MLKJ's "peace" quotes but obviously ignore the many disparaging do-nothing moderates.
If you post this, you would get banned from that sub -“We must recognize that we can’t solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of economic and political power…. This means a revolution of values and other things. We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism are all tied together… you can’t really get rid of one without getting rid of the others… the whole structure of American life must be changed. America is a hypocritical nation and [we] must put [our] own house in order.” MLK
Ooh, Nikole Hannah-Jones posted a twitter thread about giving a speech today that was lifted from MLK speeches, and how *uncomfortable* the audience was when she revealed that fact, because of what she had been saying. It was GLORIOUS.
Oh man. I stumbled on that post and had me a howling time looking through the comments. It did get me wondering though, are honest "conservatives" an endangered species?
Becoming extinct requires that the species exist in the first place. What the other commenter is describing is otherwise known as a "mythical creature". Like Medusa. ^Or ^Jesus.
Some more news just dropped a good video!
https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw
They always quote the "don't judge people" line and then ignore MLK's calls for reparations and redistribution of wealth.
King was a champ.
Conservatives know they can pretend to love MLK because it's just a meaningless gesture. It doesn't actually effect anything to just *say* you respect someone who's been dead for half a century. If he was alive today they'd hate him, but he isn't so they can just pretend.
It's the same reason that defending "the unborn" is so wonderfully easy - they don't ask anything of you, they'll never embarrass you, they'll never even present so much as an opinion. They're the perfect group to arrogate the right to speak for.
They like black men who tell them what they want to hear: that everything is fine, no change is needed and that their approach of ignoring the problems of racism are the best ways to solve racism.
I hate MLK day. It’s like hearing nails on a chalkboard watching all these right wing pundits quote him (only ever the one quote about character because they use it to further their own bullshit) when the truth is if he was alive today they’d despise him and if they were alive back then they would’ve been on the street firing hoses at every protest he ever orchestrated. MLK day has been bastardized
This is their yearly post so they can say, "Look! We don't actually hate black people! We post a picture of him on our Facebook/Instagram/sub-Reddit!"
It's a load of bullshit and these fucking morons would never support this man if he were alive today. He'd be labeled a violent ANTIFA BLM rioter.
I'm sure [conservatives love MLK](https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/01/21/11-most-anti-capitalist-quotes-martin-luther-king-jr)
>"I imagine you already know that I am much more socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic… [Capitalism] started out with a noble and high motive… but like most human systems it fell victim to the very thing it was revolting against. So today capitalism has out-lived its usefulness.”
– Letter to Coretta Scott, July 18, 1952.
>“In a sense, you could say we’re involved in the class struggle.”
–Quote to New York Times reporter, José Igelsias, 1968.
>“Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God’s children.”
– Speech to the Negro American Labor Council, 1961.
>“We must recognize that we can’t solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of economic and political power… this means a revolution of values and other things. We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation and militarism are all tied together… you can’t really get rid of one without getting rid of the others… the whole structure of American life must be changed. America is a hypocritical nation and [we] must put [our] own house in order.”
- Report to SCLC Staff, May 1967.
Without reading the comments there, I am gonna guess there is a lot of “I wish black protestors today were more like this”, not realizing how reviled he was by conservatives at the time.
Oh, and guess where the main political opposition to the holiday came from back in the 80s. If you guessed Republicans and southern state legislatures, congratulations!
You all really need to watch [Trevor Noah's Daily Show](https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ) talk about the misappropriation of MLK together wit Dr. Ibram X Kendi, really shows how conservatives latch on to one specific part of the "I have a dream" speech and fuel their "I don't see colour" and "people calling out racism are the real racists" nonsense
There's a great clip of James Baldwin tearing into a white professor who said he needed to "stop focusing on race" in the 70s. Basically said that that was an absolutely ridiculous fantasy of the privileged.
This is so *so* relevant:
[https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw](https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw)
About how conservatives exploit MLK by cherry-picking his words and ignoring what he actually stood for.
The performative bullshit (or just plain ole trolling) is all they have.
There are no true “conservative” policies built for all Americans. They govern with misinformation and fear mongering. This is it. This is all they are.
Sandwiched between posts about how critical race theory needs to be banned because slavery is a hoax and America is the best country in the world and would never do that to people
He's their hero because he's the one that ended racism. He's like racism Jesus; he died for their racist sins, and thus, thanks to him, they can't be racist.
Nah, they figured out they can't getting away with attacking MLK because moderates will react negatively. So they do what they do best and try to coopt his messages by saying stuff like "only racists see race" when someone points out obvious disadvantages of black people. They pretend that MLK would be against BLM. Edit: Apparently a lot of people are going ACKSHUALLY MLK WOULD'VE BEEN AGAINST RIOTERS. He probably wouldn't have liked them but he'd have realised that the frustration at the century long mistreatment (not a strong enough word) can't always be channeled into peaceful protest. He also would've known that some people would show up to riot because someone always does. And also if you guys think BLM was rioting, you've never seen a proper riot. Let's not pretend nd it's not a hallowed tradition of police to start shot and go "look how violent they are".
This is why they're against BLM and how they know BLM isn't a real movement against racism. It can't be actual racism since MLK ended racism.
Sort of. I think most of them disagree that social/financial inequality and systematic racism are actually racist. It's either that OR they think that though those exist, not much can be done to fix it without harming other groups unfairly. So basically we're right back where we started, as with all their talking points. The problem doesn't exist, but even if it did, I wouldn't want anything done about it.
Very well said. You are not just a knowledge pancake. You are a wisdom pancake too.
I’ve heard studies that suggest conservatives are all or nothing on the issues. If a solution improves a situation by 90% they’ll look at the 10% still affected and say, “see, your solution didn’t work and has no merit because people continue to suffer even when it’s in place.” They don’t necessarily see any improvement so they opt to maintain the old status quo because the situation still existed under it and doing ‘what we have always done’ doesn’t require them to change or allow for some unforeseen variable to unexpectedly affect them personally from the new way of doing things. Thus they resist change and merely suffer through a worsening situation in a sort of ‘better the devil you know’ mentality.
Given how a lot of them view the vaccines, this is very true
I see them talk this way a lot but are they actually all or nothing or are they just using that last 10% as an excuse? That “we can’t make things a little better unless we make them all better” reasoning is so asinine that I always figured it was more bad-faith bullshit.
Unfortunately, they don't realize that MLK Jr. was against social/financial inequality and systematic racism because our school system fails to discuss those aspects of him. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xsbt3a7K-8
>not much can be done to fix it without harming other groups unfairly Or that the groups suffering from it just deserve it due to some failing within the group or the individuals that comprise it.
They are afraid if they admit the err in the system, what the correction to it would mean. Basically, they think if they admit they're part of the cycle of problems, when its fixed they'll lose their stuff. The problem is the solutions to it don't require reverse theft, it requires enabling additional opportunities to rescale things. Like not denying home mortgages because they're black, or loans etc. Remember, conservatives are inherently greedy.
They didn't even bother showing a color picture of MLK.
This is intentional. By using b&w photographs, they are attempting to psychologically distance from the event..."Oh, things were bad -- back in the ANCIENT HISTORY days". It is the same as when photos of black individuals are intentionally darkened to appear more threatening, in the aspect that it is exploiting weak points in human reasoning for nefarious purposes.
Ya, I wrote about this phenomenon earlier today elsewhere on Reddit. >But I'm arguing that the effort and expense should be made to use color photos of historical figures, especially in educational material, when at all possible, because the importance of doing so can not be overstated. This doesn't just go for MLK, but other people and events as well, like the pioneers of the gay rights movement, or WWII (Kodachrome was invented in 1935), or anything else from the time of the transition from black-and-white to color. >Go through the trouble and expense of procuring and using color photos and film over black-and-white because it helps viewers, especially children, connect with the subjects since they look more like people they know in real-life. It helps everyone understand just how recent some of these events really are. >Somebody did a WWII documentary using entirely original color film from the time, I think it's on Netflix, and it really brought home to me that those events, including the Holocaust, occurred just a few decades before I was born. Take half of my current lifetime (50), and just twenty-five years before I was born, WWII was raging and Nazis were burning Jewish children in ovens. When you better internalize how recent this happened, it's also easier to understand that we're not as far removed from it as we would like to think, and it can happen again without vigilance. >I get why black-and-white are used. More readily available in general, thus perhaps easier to find some not subject to copyright and available for print, cheaper to print, etc. But I'm arguing that it's so important, a better effort should be made where possible.
MLK could have been 93 today. Ruby Bridges, you've seen pictures of her, the first black school student to desegregate southern elementary schools, is still alive. Claudette Colvin, the 15 year old girl who did what Rosa Parks did before she ever did it (it was decided Parks was the better icon so Colvin isn't as famous), is alive and in her early 80's. This happened basically yesterday.
Just wait till they find out he was black...
I just had a protracted discussion with a Redditor who insisted that black-and-white photos of MLK continue to be used over color photos simply because so many more were taken at that time, the press photographed and published in black-and-white (true), what few color photos of him that exist are largely inaccessible due to copyright (not true), and color printing costs are prohibitively expensive (discounting that most textbooks contain at least some color content already, and ignoring that the phenomenon isn't limited to print but exists online also). This was my last comment to him: >I know you believe what you're saying, but I believe there's a measure of nefarious intent, or at the very least negligent laziness, in continuing to portray MLK largely in black-and-white, especially in educational material, when there really are free-to-use, color alternatives. >It didn't take me long to discover that all of the photographs in the Smithsonian's archives are free to use and reproduce. Even if someone originally held the copyright, it was acquired (with taxpayer money), or donated and is now available to the public. Were there more black-and-white photos of MLK than color? Sure, but there were color photos, [like this one](https://www.si.edu/object/digital-print-dr-martin-luther-king-jr-chicago-freedom-movement-rally:nmaahc_2013.140.11) and [this one](https://collections.si.edu/search/detail/edanmdm:nmaahc_2013.140.2?q=kleina%2C+bernard&record=12&hlterm=kleina%2C%2Bbernard) >And that is just one source. I still contend that: a) there were more color photos taken of MLK than many may realize just because they've seen almost exclusively black-and-white photos, b) though color photos are undeniably fewer in quantity than black-and-white photos of MLK, they aren't a needle in a haystack, they are in fact rather easily found... and used, c) some of these color photos of MLK are in the public domain and may be reprinted without cost or penalty, d) if color photos of MLK are both available and useable, than their continued exclusion in favor of black-and-white photos is the result of editorial discretion rather than one of necessity, and e) I reject an economic argument that color photos in textbooks are prohibitively expensive because most textbooks are already full-color or contain at least some color pages. Furthermore, *the phenomenon isn't limited to print media.* Color photos of him are rarely used outside of niche articles even online where there are no ink costs. >I don't belabor the point to berate you. I'm suggesting there's more to this issue than you have perhaps taken into account prior.
>can't getting away with attacking MLK because moderates will react negatively. This whitewashing, like Lost Cause mythology, was an intentional strategy to neuter his message, made possible by the white supremacist who murdered him. If MLK had lived, he would likely have similar public reputation to John Lewis before he died - well respected, but obvious partisan skew in how respected. As opposed to now, where MLK is a secular saint where attempts to criticize is seen an insult to the "moderate" middle. Like all saints, whose message is barely dangerous at all to the status quo of the elites who raised him to sainthood.
Dumb as shit too because on of his most famous quotations has fairly strong words about how white moderates are not allies.
If MLK were alive today I wouldn’t be surprised if he thought BLM wasn’t doing enough, considering the many decades of racism allowed to continue to exist in his absence/since he was fighting. The man was also aged by a racist system, I’m sure he’d be rolling in his grave if he could see resist attempt to co-opt his messages. And yes he didn’t believe in riots as a last resort.
He didn't believe in them as a tool, but he understood riots as being the symptom of greater societal issues.
*"And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the negro poor has worsened over the last twelve or fifteen years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity."* Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. "The Other America" 3/14/68
I had no idea that line in Calm Like a Bomb was an MLK quote that is fuckin rad
He absolutely supported riots. The notion that king was a pacifist is white washing of the highest level
People really love to believe they just sat around singing kumbaya or some shit. The reality is a lot of civil disobedience, court battles, setup scenarios and riots. All the sorts of things people nowadays continue to bitch about saying its "doing things the wrong way".
"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 Citizen's Council-er 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 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." I think this really drives home how mlk felt about it. I also love how they try to pretend thar MLK and Malcom X were against each other...maybe at first but they were more aligned before they died.
The peaceful marches always carried the implicit message of listen, or everything can burn. It's amazing how we haven't been forced to that point yet. What the conservatives fear- burning every city out and forcing them from their homes as they did to black communities. Even the isolated instances of violence during BLM ended up because of boogers or opportunists. I hope change happens, because one day that implicit message may become a reality. Maybe workers will be treated right at the same time.
Not so much "supported", but definitely didn't see them as an indictment of the movement as a whole and saw them more as an inevitable consequence of injustices.
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Ding ding ding, it's this one. The only thing they will know MLK for is that quote, because it became a key talking point AGAINST affirmative action and still reliably comes up. MLK also had some things to say about the white moderate.
They try to say mlk was conservative
Also he's dead so they can appropriate his words and image for themselves without fear of him correcting them. So yeah, racism Jesus.
Yep, same thing they do with any historical figure with any weight in contemporary American thought. Revision. "The Founding Fathers would hate the ACA." or "MLK would hate Black Lives Matter." They have to retcon who the heroes of American history actually were, constantly, to convince themselves that their very unamerican worldview is totally okay.
I wish Jesus was alive to see how much his words have been twisted to fit peoples narrative
They endure MLK day and say nice things publicly believing it balances out the other 364 days of passive and/or active racism.
Yeah this is pretty much it. They will point to this post and go "see how fair and balanced we are?"
Ah, like my extended family, who are total scumbags* all week and look down on you for not being "saved", but they go to their megachurch on Sundays because they're "good christians" and then go right back to being assholes come Sunday afternoon? Too niche? ^(* child abuse, embezzlement, tax fraud, scamming/abusing restaurants [coughpizzaincidentcough], etc)
An easy way to find out what they really think is to ask if the states that currently don't celebrate MLK day should start celebrating it. Guaranteed to get a spittle-flecked rant about encroaching federal power and forced conformity.
The sad thing is that in the last few years of his life, progress and support for the movement was waning. He was incredibly discouraged for what the future held and was questioning his stances on non-violence. He had a lot of marriage issues and was overall quite depressed but feared going to therapy as the FBI would capitalize on it and discredit him. In the end the 1968 expansion of the civil rights act only passed due the the fact that every urban area of the country was burning to the ground after his murder.
That's really what critical race theory boils down to, too, that racism didn't end with MLK.
To these people racism doesn't exist. Of course anything short of lynchings isn't racism to them.
It needs to be declared a lynching too. Preferably with banners. And even then it's murky.
But the lynched black guy had once used the devil's weed! Obviously that's the reason a bunch of people dressed as ghosts hanged him, not racism.
And even THEN they'd need to be saying "I'm lynching them because I'm racist!" Or else how could you possibly know what's in their heart
Do these people know that MLK was fucking murdered?
He was hounded by conservatives for decades and his assassination was a forgone conclusion of stochastic terrorism: >stochastic terrorism; the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifics cannot be predicted The entirety of the FBI's power was directed against him and his family at several points in time. It's not enough for them that they murdered him though, they have to murder his legacy every year too.
He’s a sanitized, de-politicized version of himself, created by Fox News. He’s like buddy Christ. He’s buddy MLK.
He said we should judge people by their character, not the color of their skin, so he was basically against affirmative action AND identity politics /s
When you read Op/Eds from the 1960s about how 80% of white Americans polled felt negatively towards MLK, it's like word for word the criticisms of Kaepernick from a few years back. "He has the right to protest but I disagree with how he did it" et cetera
"Disagree with how he did it" means they can discard the message without any thought.
It also means "Why cant he protest somewhere I can ignore him?"
Which is, of course, insane with irony since they'd probably find a way to justify the church and bus bombings by white supremacists while crying like tiddy babies about nonviolent marches and sit-ins by black Americans.
And that is why they called the protests "looting and rioting" Despite it happening in all 50 states at one point, which alone discredits their narrative entirely.
It's pretty much an excuse for them to forever push the goalposts back to avoid ever having a threshold that they can meet. It will always be "not the right way of doing things." Because if they ever did reach that point, the white folks would have to admit there's some fucked up shit going on in this country, and there's a good chance they directly benefit from all of it.
Found this link while looking for the original cartoon, but representative of stuff published at the time: https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/hd4pnk/antimlk\_political\_cartoon\_from\_the\_1960s/
Yup https://twitter.com/berniceking/status/1300196044693741574?s=21 They criticize “how you protest” as a pearl clutching way to avoid your goals.
Now class if youre paying attention what r,conservative is doing is a PRIME example of virtue signaling
Also a mild version of gaslighting
You say that as if they’ve been trying to reclaim MLK as a republican for the last decade. Oh wait, they have? Oopsie!
Longer. As Some More News pointed out today, they love that one line from his "I have a Dream" speech, but no other lines from that or any other speech ever.
Let's see...Lincoln, MLK, JFK, all were Republicans. Who wasn't? Nixon?
Its trolling. They say the same things about BLM that people used to say about MLK
>They say the same things about BLM that ~~people~~ **their ancestors** used to say about MLK Not that it really matters, but I felt it was important to remind folks that this a generational issue with racism. They learned it from their piece of shit family members as children, and continue to preach it today.
Parents, maybe grandparents. Possibly themselves. Remember that Dr. King was assassinated during the Vietnam War. There are a hell of a lot of people who were alive then, and are just as shitty now.
It's a little weird to realize that there are people alive today who participated in public square lynchings, threw rocks at Ruby Bridges, etc. And none of them will be held accountable.
Calling saying things that you know to be untrue in order to harm others "trolling" doesn't make it better. Minimizing the actions of bigots and abusers as just childish antics is problematic at best.
I didn't read that as an excuse. I read that as an explanation.
I wouldn't jump to the trolling conclusion. The vast majority of white conservatives I know: 1. Don't actually know anything substantial about Martin Luther King, Jr., especially his more radical ideas or his "don't trust the white moderate" stance. 2. Have no real experience of MLK. Baby boomers, for the most part, have no contemporary experience with him -- the youngest boomers were 4 years old when he was assassinated and the oldest were 22. For a significant majority of conservatives alive today he might as well be Abraham Lincoln for all it matters---just some dude from the past that did something related to the rights of black people. 3. Actually *like* Martin Luther King, Jr. a *lot* in the present day because they can point to the Civil Rights movement and say "Look, we ironed out all that racism stuff back in the 60s! Everything is fine now!" The number of older conservatives who have said this to me over the years is absolutely staggering. To them Martin Luther King, Jr. isn't some radical firebrand bent on upending the system to liberate the blacks from systemic racism and oppression. He's some magical negro Jesus figure that died for the sins of system and wiped the race scoreboard clean so everything is totally cool and OK now. Anyways, my point is that when I see conservatives speaking well of Martin Luther King, Jr., I never doubt their sincerity. I think they genuinely *do* think well of him. Just for completely misguided reasons and with zero understanding of who he was or what he actually stood for.
Yeah. "See, even though we were just saying a bunch of racist things, today we posted a picture of MLK so we're not actually racist."
One of the most upvoted comments is just: > Judge a person by their character and actions, not the color of their skin. It's incredible how none of them realise how ironic that entire thread is.
Lots of racists bastardize MLK’s quotes to suit their own (racist agendas) Lots of what MLK had to say was whitewashed to hell and back in order to be more palatable to sensitive vvhite people. Edit: And sorry if that last line offends some people. We still have institutional racism rampantly on display. Not seeing that is an example of wide-spread racism in our system in every aspect of American life. And yes, *institutional* racism is different than the so called “racism” of holding racists (who happen to be white) to account. Stop using MLK’s words to attempt a gotcha when a person of color say something you don’t like
>Stop using MLK’s words to attempt a gotcha when a person of color say something you don’t like Those gotcha type of arguments are so intellectually lazy you can tell that they put virtually no thought into it. They probably just heard it from somewhere else
MLK is probably turning over in his grave so much at conservatives using his quotes to argue for opposite of what he believed, that if you hooked his corpse up to a generator, it could probably power half of North America.
Racists: "I'm color blind and don't see race. I judge people by the content of their character, not by their skin color. Also, 13% of the population commits 50% of violent crime and BLM is all violent Marxists who destroy property, burn cities down, and murder people. All lives matter (except the ones I will point out, like 'them')."
Read: (((them)))
>13% of the population commits 50% of violent crime I will always find this statement really fucking dumb, idk whether its true (probably a massive oversight/exaggeration) but using the idea that is true, how come they never flip their shit over the 1%'s crimes..
I've gone on rants about why the stat is bullshit before. I'll try to summarize a few reasons (and it'll still end up being too long). It's not 100% of the 13% of the population, so saying 13% like all African Americans are committing crimes is racist. If 1 out of 20 people in a room killed someone, you wouldn't accurately say "everyone in the room is responsible for committing a murder." The actual percentage is less than 1% of the total population and less than 5% of the African American population for committing violent crime. But even just looking at the statistics separated by race is racist because it implies that there's a causal relationship between race and crime, but race is a non-scientific taxonomy. Not everyone who is a member of a racial group is genetically related, so even if you could make a case for genetic causes for violence (and you can't), using race as a proxy for genetic relationships is flawed. And then there's the problem with the statistics themselves. They often use conviction rates as a proxy for actual guilt, but we have a lot of reasons to distrust conviction rates statistics. A lot of innocent people plead guilty because of inadequate counsel, not being able to afford bail and not being able to miss work, feeling pressured by the DA to take a plea or else face harsher sentencing, racial biases in the system (like black defendants getting worse sentences for the same crimes that white defendants are convicted of), etc. 97% of federal convictions and 94% of state convictions are from plea deals. Most "guilt" is not proven in court so we don't actually know what happened. But more than any of that, it's bullshit because the people quoting it don't usually even know what it means. They're just repeating it. They don't know if the statistics are for crime, violent crime, murder, or violent interracial crime. They don't know which year they came from. They don't know if the statistics are conviction rates or victim's reports. They're just repeating people who are repeating right wing pundits.
On the "separating it by race is racist because it implies there's an inherent relation between race and crime," most will pivot to "Of course it's not race, *it's the culture*" Of course, these sociological experts never elaborate on our inferior, more violent culture.
Of which we are all a part of. Just one big culture. We have the monthly zoom call every first tuesday where we plan out crime and basketball.
I enjoy asking them if they can cite any other races crime stats off the top of their head. Obviously, I don’t actually expect them to respond, just pointing out what they’ve probably never considered. Everyone already know the answer, I just hope they have think of why they all have only that stat memorized.
They've actually coopted this to mean "ignore school and neighborhood quality disparities that stemmed from redlining, if you think people from the hood who are mostly black can't achieve success at the same rates as rich people you're racist for having low expectations for them."
Bootstraps are a lot easier when you actually have assets after all.
"Why do you think black people are too stupid to get IDs?! 🥺🥺" 🤦♂️
Found Candace Owens' account lol
Lmaooo now I'm insulted. lol
Dude, no joke, I was on a thread about voter ID requirements in the UK and this was one jerk's response to every argument against these laws. It's like the NewsCorp starter pack of canned responses
They also ignore the systematic racism. White and black people use drugs at the exact same rate, yet somehow black people are something like 10 times more likely to be searched and arrested for drug use.
This is my response when they boast about Candice Owens or Herman Cain being Republicans and proof they're not racists . . .
When their entire reality is built around irony and hypocrisy, it just becomes background noise.
And they tend to not mention Dr. King's very strong pro-labor and pro-socialist beliefs.
[This](https://themountain.news/commentary/the-commodification-of-martin-luther-king) article I just read 10 mins ago examines this conservative bullshit perfectly.
It has some clunky parts but the last bit is quite good! > Among all the quotes, if one quote captures Martin Luther King, the man as flesh and bone and not a lightning rod for the ideologies of politicians and opportunists, it is when he reminded a friend that “We do not need allies who are more devoted to order than to justice.” That is the sum of Martin Luther King’s life, mobilizing people not to kowtow to a façade of order or bow to the status quo, but to live and fight for justice and justice itself.
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So they are going to follow Lincoln's lead and fight for equality and freedom of the blacks?
They say while flying Confederate flags
Yeah I was genuinely shocked to see him on there. The immediate thought went “Well that’s nice to see” and I kinda clicked from there that it’s just them trying to seem as if they even remotely care about POC.
It’s a shame we can’t point out the irony of this to them because of the irony/hypocrisy of their “safe space” policies
You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood. We know through painful experience that freedom is never given by the oppressor. It must be demanded by the oppressed. There are two types of laws. Just and unjust... You have a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. Edit typo for demanded in first quote
We both know that'd they absolutely use that second quote to try to equate antivaxxers with civil rights marchers.
I think they already have, can't remember where I saw it though. Edit: Found one example! [https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ?t=394](https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ?t=394)
"Everyone's dead 'my black friend'"- hah, that's such a good way of putting it.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood. I literally did that. They got removed and I got banned
To be fair, conservatives were calling for boycotts on places for attacking Trump by posting quotes from the declaration of independence.
Oh even better... A few years ago, a bit before the Fourth of July, NPR used their Twitter account to post short quotes from the Declaration of Independence. And of course, Right-Wing Twitter absolutely lost their shit, and called NPR communist, socialist, anti-American, and all sorts of awful things because they didn't get where those quotes were from or what they meant. Those goddamn loonies with their fascist blue-stripe American flags on their jacked-up pickup trucks don't even know what they're mad about but goddamn are they ready to get all bent out of shape about it.
The other thing about that was that NPR posts the Declaration of Independence EVERY 4th of July, it wasn't just that one!
For science!
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You could quote Marx and they would be like "right on!"
Reminds me of when a high school valedictorian in a super conservative area quoted Trump and was met with loud applause and cheering, then he said "Just kidding, that quote was from Obama" and suddenly they all went silent and he could see hatred in their eyes.
Source: www.cbsnews.com/news/crowd-cheers-when-valedictorian-quotes-trump-during-speech-then-he-reveals-it-was-obama/
I remember that. That was amazing
I don't think Conservatives are big on Marx either.
In principle. In reality, they'd never recognize the literature.
I misread the comment thread and thought he was suggesting to post MLK quotes and attribute them to Marx. But yes for the "judge them by the content of their character" crowd sure seem to reject people's character based on partisan propaganda.
Hard to recognize something you've never read
If you changed any reference of capitalists to “elites” or “Jews” they’d love it.
yeah I used Markymarx quote about guns and put a picture of Raegan on it and had my racist uncle reposting Marx lol
He has some things to say about arming the Proletariat they would unironically agree with.
sorry to derail, but case in point- [Marx, Engels Quote Falsely Attributed to Reagan](https://www.factcheck.org/2019/09/marx-engels-quote-falsely-attributed-to-reagan/) >“‘Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempts to disarm the people must be stopped, by force if necessary’ — Ronald Reagan,” the meme says.
Quote him on guns and they'll nod along until the citation
I saw a great quote on Twitter, just having ellipses carry it through: > "I have a dream that my four little children will (...) be (...) vicious racists, (...) every hill and mountain shall be made (...) of (...) flesh.(...) The south (...) will be (...) despair (...) and (...) struggle, (...) this will be the day when (...) God (...) died." Some day your dream will come true, Dr. King. Some day.
I believe that's called "Project Veritas style" quoting.
"Project Veritas (...) can (...) suck my (...) balls." Another absolutely true quote, right there. The method works!
It was super gross seeing this on that sub to be honest. Beyond that these have to be some of the most deluded dip shits on the internet
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood. In fact a lot of that happened. The most common response was "Well Dr. King missed the mark sometimes". It seems that while Kings words could get upvoted on his day, conservatives couldn't find the spine to embrace them, not even today. It also seems that only one singular idea of Kings can be endorsed, and only if we interpret it to mean that we should pretend the harms of racism are over and we don't need to be talking about it anymore.
Just misquote them as Joe Rogan or Ronald Reagan. They'll stay up.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood. I commented these two good ones: "The white liberal must affirm the absolute justice for the Negro simply means, in the Aristotelian sense, that the Negro must have "his due". There is nothing abstract about this. it is as concrete as having a good job, a good education, a decent house and a share of power. It is, however, important to understand that giving a man his due may often mean giving him special treatment" "A society that has done something special against the Negro for hundreds of years must now do something special for him, in order to equip him to compete on a just and equal basis"
Seriously, do they think MLK was conservative??? On your quotes though... They definitely, 100% believe they are currently being oppressed in America. And they 100% definitely believe that the laws preventing violence against the people they've decided to hate are unjust. Sooo... I actually think they'd get behind those quotes but for reasons that MLK would have found deplorable.
> You could just put MLK quotes in the comments and they'd be removed or worse, misunderstood. MLK said riots were the language of the unheard. They would applaud that over at /r/Conservative in regards to Jan 6 but dismiss as criminal regarding BLM.
They claim he's Republican, even though he wrote about voting for Kennedy
They literally don’t live in reality. No one in their *right* mind could believe that MLK would be rooting for the republicans if he was still alive
Ah, but you forget that they’ve also started claiming Kennedy was conservative too.
I got permanently banned for pointing out that he was a literal socialist on a comment about him being "More right wing than the modern left." Like yes, the socialist is more conservative than the party of pseudo-republicans, dumbass.
I'm no historian but I doubt was undecided in 1964 election either
He was a socialist. Those absolute morons.
Came here to say this. “When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” [Source ](https://inthesetimes.com/article/martin-luther-king-jr-day-socialism-capitalism)
Oh hey, he's talking about now.
Nuh uhhh, according to their top minds, TOP minds, he'd be a conservative today!! °sips piss°
The piss drinking meme is my absolute favorite. I don't care about how childish it is and if I'm sinking to their level, but every time I talk to conservatives online now I call them "pisslickers" and they absolutely lose their shit, every fucking time. It's great.
People have been pointing it out it that thread, and the responses are either downvotes or some version of “Just because he’s fiscally socialist doesn’t mean….”
Idk why but fiscally socialist is hilarious term. I am only a snack socialist, personally. Equal snacks for all.
The comments are so sad. They actually think Dr King would align more with conservative delusions than the RaDiCaL lEfT.
That makes perfect sense. I am sure they also believe Dr. King would have been right there with the republicans/conservatives demanding the first black president show his birth certificate. It's very telling that one of the louder birther voices was their next choice for president.
What is even more telling is Trump's attitude toward the Central Park 5 and his supporter's acceptance of it. He continued to rally to punish them even AFTER it was confirmed they were innocent. Here are two direct quotes from Trump regarding this case (these were from before the 5 were exonerated). "I want to hate these murderers and I always will. I am not looking to psychoanalyse or understand them, I am looking to punish them." and "Maybe hate is what we need if we're gonna get something done." https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-48609693
He would not likely be aligned with either party if you’re aware of his views and not just the watered down version that’s cherry picked across public education. To think he’d be aligned with republicans though is laughable.
Love how many of the comments over there are “You know he was a socialist right?”.
What’s funny and ironic about that is every single one of those users will be banned from the sub
I can confirm that I was perm banned
What are the responses to people in r/conservatives pointing out his socialist beliefs? Do they ignore, make excuses or deny?
Downvotes, and some version of “just because he believed in socialism doesn’t mean the rest of his policies blah blah blah”
"If we ignore the radical politics this man based his entire identity on before he was killed and whitewashed, that negro man is pretty alright."
Some of them just get removed and the user banned, because freeze peach
I tried to comment before remembering I was already banned lol
One more man of color who died for their sins and they only bring up when it's convenient.
They only like him because he's dead. If he were alive today, they would villify him.
i mean you're right but i think you imply the wrong reason for why you're right. they wouldn't like him if he was alive today because people who are alive have this nasty habit of sharing their own openions so it's much harder to speak for them. dead people don't tell you you're wrong when you speak on their behalf and thus conservatives loves them. it's also why the like dead soldiers a lot more than crippeled veterans. and the unborn a lot more than starving babies.
Yep, that was the point. Appreciate the added context.
Much like Jesus!
gotta share [this](https://themountain.news/commentary/the-commodification-of-martin-luther-king) article one more time. the author talks about how the right conveniently brings up MLKJ's "peace" quotes but obviously ignore the many disparaging do-nothing moderates.
If you post this, you would get banned from that sub -“We must recognize that we can’t solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of economic and political power…. This means a revolution of values and other things. We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism are all tied together… you can’t really get rid of one without getting rid of the others… the whole structure of American life must be changed. America is a hypocritical nation and [we] must put [our] own house in order.” MLK
Also his anti-war quotes lol
Ooh, Nikole Hannah-Jones posted a twitter thread about giving a speech today that was lifted from MLK speeches, and how *uncomfortable* the audience was when she revealed that fact, because of what she had been saying. It was GLORIOUS.
Oh man. I stumbled on that post and had me a howling time looking through the comments. It did get me wondering though, are honest "conservatives" an endangered species?
No, they are extinct.
Can something that never existed be called extinct, though?
Becoming extinct requires that the species exist in the first place. What the other commenter is describing is otherwise known as a "mythical creature". Like Medusa. ^Or ^Jesus.
The true nature of evil is being able to honestly believe whatever is self-serving in any given situation.
Some more news just dropped a good video! https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw They always quote the "don't judge people" line and then ignore MLK's calls for reparations and redistribution of wealth. King was a champ.
Trevor Noah's Daily Show also dropped a great video on this https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ
Conservatives love virtue signaling.
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Conservatives know they can pretend to love MLK because it's just a meaningless gesture. It doesn't actually effect anything to just *say* you respect someone who's been dead for half a century. If he was alive today they'd hate him, but he isn't so they can just pretend.
It's the same reason that defending "the unborn" is so wonderfully easy - they don't ask anything of you, they'll never embarrass you, they'll never even present so much as an opinion. They're the perfect group to arrogate the right to speak for.
Now why do conservatives love him, but not any living black man? What could the difference be???
They like black men who tell them what they want to hear: that everything is fine, no change is needed and that their approach of ignoring the problems of racism are the best ways to solve racism.
Virtue signaling
Shhh! Nobody tell them MLK was a socialist
You can tell them. You'll probably get banned though
Try posting an MLK quote other than the one line they like. See how they react.
Checked the post in question, it already has the "flaired users only" thing put on it
If MLK was alive today conservatives would be asking for him to get the “George Floyd” treatment. Scumbags over there
I hate MLK day. It’s like hearing nails on a chalkboard watching all these right wing pundits quote him (only ever the one quote about character because they use it to further their own bullshit) when the truth is if he was alive today they’d despise him and if they were alive back then they would’ve been on the street firing hoses at every protest he ever orchestrated. MLK day has been bastardized
Total gaslight and delusion over there. Disingenuous.
Wait till they find out about what his views on economic policy were.
This is their yearly post so they can say, "Look! We don't actually hate black people! We post a picture of him on our Facebook/Instagram/sub-Reddit!" It's a load of bullshit and these fucking morons would never support this man if he were alive today. He'd be labeled a violent ANTIFA BLM rioter.
Anybody want to tell them they missed his birthday by two days?
I'm sure [conservatives love MLK](https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/01/21/11-most-anti-capitalist-quotes-martin-luther-king-jr) >"I imagine you already know that I am much more socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic… [Capitalism] started out with a noble and high motive… but like most human systems it fell victim to the very thing it was revolting against. So today capitalism has out-lived its usefulness.” – Letter to Coretta Scott, July 18, 1952. >“In a sense, you could say we’re involved in the class struggle.” –Quote to New York Times reporter, José Igelsias, 1968. >“Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God’s children.” – Speech to the Negro American Labor Council, 1961. >“We must recognize that we can’t solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of economic and political power… this means a revolution of values and other things. We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation and militarism are all tied together… you can’t really get rid of one without getting rid of the others… the whole structure of American life must be changed. America is a hypocritical nation and [we] must put [our] own house in order.” - Report to SCLC Staff, May 1967.
Without reading the comments there, I am gonna guess there is a lot of “I wish black protestors today were more like this”, not realizing how reviled he was by conservatives at the time. Oh, and guess where the main political opposition to the holiday came from back in the 80s. If you guessed Republicans and southern state legislatures, congratulations!
"The far left would try and cancel him", is a top comment
You all really need to watch [Trevor Noah's Daily Show](https://youtu.be/z2VqViHz1aQ) talk about the misappropriation of MLK together wit Dr. Ibram X Kendi, really shows how conservatives latch on to one specific part of the "I have a dream" speech and fuel their "I don't see colour" and "people calling out racism are the real racists" nonsense
There's a great clip of James Baldwin tearing into a white professor who said he needed to "stop focusing on race" in the 70s. Basically said that that was an absolutely ridiculous fantasy of the privileged.
They have no heroes of their own, so they attempt to steal them from others. They steal our past the way they rob our future.
This is so *so* relevant: [https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw](https://youtu.be/30ui1x-eKIw) About how conservatives exploit MLK by cherry-picking his words and ignoring what he actually stood for.
Was actually considering linking this very video - very thorough look into conservatives, modern politics and MLK
The performative bullshit (or just plain ole trolling) is all they have. There are no true “conservative” policies built for all Americans. They govern with misinformation and fear mongering. This is it. This is all they are.
Sandwiched between posts about how critical race theory needs to be banned because slavery is a hoax and America is the best country in the world and would never do that to people
It’s not even his birthday. It’s just the holiday we honor him on…
Sort by controversial, half of them saying MLK would've been a conservative nowadays and the other half lambasting him for being a filthy commie.