A Portrait of The Many People who Don’t Actually Like MLK

April 4, 2018 will mark the commemoration of 50 years since the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We will post and tweet in his memory. If someone walked up and asked you your opinion of Dr. King, you would most likely have remarks of admiration.

And yet, I imagine that if Dr. King were alive today, there’s only a 40% chance you would actually approve of him.

That was Dr. King’s approval rating at the time of his death, and I’m not sure it would be much higher today.

We like that think that had we been alive 50 years ago, we would have admired Dr. King. Or perhaps we know that even if it’s unlikely we would have admired Dr. King, at least we are fortunate to live in a time where the communities we live in have matured and now hold a gentler view of Dr. King than we once would have if we lived in these same communities during his lifetime.

Many of us give ourselves too much credit.

No doubt, we are attracted to the apocryphal version of Dr. King that is currently accepted as historical. In general terms, many Americans desire peace and equality. Or at the very least, we know that our historical documents and current social standards force us to proclaim such desires.

But those are broad-stroke views of Dr. King’s message that fail to acknowledge what he was doing and talking about near the end of his life.

While many Americans currently question the patriotism of athletes who chose to protest during the Star Spangled Banner, Dr. King was working on an Olympic boycott that would later birth the John Carlos and Tommie Smith protest on the medal podium at the 1968 Olympic games.

While many Americans favor voting policies that make it harder for people of color to vote, Dr. King was working to ensure all Americans could utilize their right to vote.

While many Americans are currently digging in to justify the ownership and use of firearms, Dr. King gave up his firearms and insisted that only unarmed guards keep watch at his house. This despite the fact that he was under constant threat from both white supremacists and the FBI.

While many Americans are banging the drums of war, Dr. King spoke out against the war in Vietnam.

While many Americans advocate for more military spending while underfunding healthcare and education, Dr. King warned us that “a nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”

While many Americans shout down the protests of young people, Dr. King was just 25 when he rose to prominence.

While many Americans shout down the protests of people of color when they infringe on traffic patterns or business flow, Dr. King organized a bus boycott and a sanitation workers strike that shut down major cities.

While many Americans shout down the protests of women, women were a critical part of the Civil Rights Movement.

While many Americans self-segregate and gentrify neighborhoods, Dr. King advocated for fair housing practices.

As it stands now, America’s embrace of a watered down version of Dr. King serves more to silence the voices of the marginalized than it does to move us closer to his vision of an equal and just America that is defined by The Most Durable Power. We don’t quote Dr. King because his prophetic witness resonates with us and calls us to change. Many of us quote Dr. King because it’s a socially acceptable passive-aggressive way to silence protest.

The message many Americans propagate 50 years after Dr. King’s death is that things aren’t that bad anymore. Marginalized people can express themselves, but they can’t do it in ways that are disruptive. Or in ways that call America to kept the promises that she has made. Or in ways that would call others to renegotiate their preferences and luxuries for the sake of equal rights. Honestly, many of us have so many qualifiers for how the marginalized can express themselves that they would be rendered paralyzed trying to jump through all of the socially acceptable hoops.

That was not the message of Dr. King.

The reality is that if we go down the list of things Dr. King was doing and find we have been speaking out against them in our current context, we probably wouldn’t like Dr. King much if he were alive today. Our news sources, pundits, blogs, tweets and posts would slander him.

That would be our attitude, and we wouldn’t be alone in it. We would be in the company of many Americans. And as much as it pains me to say it, a lot of them would be sitting in the pews with you on Sunday.