“What Would Martin Say?” Reflections on Race at Home and Abroad

Just came across this introduction to a speech I gave at the United Nations, on March 26, 2008, commemorating the 40th anniversary of Dr. King’s death. It was shortly after then-Senator Obama gave his “Speech on Race.”

“I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality, and freedom for their spirits. I believe what self-centered people have torn down other-centered people can build up. — MLK Jr.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” — MLK Jr.

The significance of Barack Obama’s speech did not lie solely in WHAT he said but also in the context in which he said it. The speech occurred at a particular moment in our history, a moment in which both the particular message and the particular messenger were essential in potentially impacting the narrow and confining notion of race as we have known it for so long. Senator Obama was perhaps uniquely situated to deliver that speech, given his unique biracial and multicultural background and the national platform he now commands as a viable contender for President of the United States. This is not to suggest that the content of his speech was not momentous; it was quite powerful. Indeed, Senator Obama should be credited with seizing the opportunity to begin this important dialogue, even as his handlers told him it would be political suicide. And given what we have come to expect of politicians, the speech was rare in its honesty, nuance, substance, and accessibility. It gave eloquent voice to the experiences of many Americans, black, white and other.

On a personal note, I will admit to one thing, however. I was a bit impatient, to put it mildly, with the fact that Obama was compelled to give the speech in the first place. That anyone with any knowledge of American history at all would not understand the reasons behind the lingering anger and resentment of people like Reverend Jeremiah Wright is both disappointing and a powerful indication of just how deep the chasm of misunderstanding is with regard to race in this country.

Certainly, America does not have a monopoly on racism. Five years ago, I was invited to give a speech on racial profiling in Moscow. I was flattered and excited to be visiting Russia for the first time. But I wondered: just WHO, in largely blond-haired, blue-eyed Russia, bears the brunt of discrimination in that country? I soon learned that it was the Chechens and the Roma (or gypsies). It was an ephiphanal moment for me, giving content to what I had otherwise known mostly in the abstract: that it is the darker-skinned members of whatever society (whether modern or historic) we’re in who bear the brunt of racism and discrimination. It is a fairly universal truth, I would argue.

As an African-American male who grew up in the South, I am all too familiar with prejudice and discrimination. But I have also been the victim of prejudice abroad. Just last month, while on vacation in Italy, I experienced at least 3 blatant episodes of racism over the course of just a few days. Similarly, five years ago, while vacationing in Paris, I experienced a few incidents. And even while vacationing in Africa — one year ago, at a beach resort in Senegal with two white friends — a white European woman, I think German, approached me and asked if I would wash the sand off her feet. After a few choice words from me, she soon learned the error of her ways. But I thought to myself: damn, I can’t even go to Africa to escape racism. Sadly, it made perfect sense, however, as just days before, I had stood in the doorway of the “Door of No Return,” in one of the most notorious slave castles on Goree Island, where more than 30 million slaves had passed on their involuntary journey across the Atlantic Ocean. As Senator Obama said so eloquently, it is that very slave trade that is the original source of the numerous disparities that continue to plague so many African-Americans today, as well as the source of some of the anger and resentment that many continue to feel.

It goes without saying that more than African-Americans bear the brunt of racism and discrimination in America. Particularly after 9/11, Muslims, Arabs, and South Asians have experienced untold levels of racism and discrimination. And in this current anti-immigrant environment, Hispanics, in particular, face rampant animosity.

Dr. King’s statement that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” challenges us to look beyond our immediate families, communities, cities, states, and countries and to combat racism on the global scale on which it exists.

Dr. King also famously said that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” We can see justice in the distant horizon. But we will never get there if all people of good will sit idly by in the face of current injustice.