We Have Failed Dr. King

Today is the MLK Holiday.  Normally, this is a day that I set aside to celebrate Dr. King’s life and legacy or it’s a day of service to the community.  But today, especially with the inauguration of Donald Trump just days away, is more of a day of reflection.

As a country, we have greatly failed Dr. King.  Greatly.  I have wondered what would he think if he could see the current state of affairs in these Divided States of America.  Would he wonder why he marched, protested, took beatings, survived a stabbing, had his home bombed, his family threatened, and his life taken for things to be just as they were decades ago?

Would he wonder why there is still a problem with police brutality in the Black community?  Would he wonder why unarmed Black men and women are killed by the police at a rate far higher than other racial groups?  Would he be surprised that the reasons the police give to use deadly force now are the same ones the officer in Selma back in 1965 used after the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson … that the officer feared for his life?  That the Black man was threatening?  That the officer thought the Black man had a weapon?  Would Dr. King’s heart skip a beat when he watched videos of school resource officers forcefully slamming our Black teenaged girls to the ground and not face any punishment?

Would Dr. King be saddened that after all these years it’s still necessary for us to remind the country that Black lives matter? 

Would Dr. King be disappointed that groups of people are still fighting for their rights to equality?  Fighting for the right to basic healthcare?  Fighting for the right to marry whom they chose?  Fighting for the right to equal pay for equal work?

Would Dr. King’s heart be broken to know that nearly 54 years after the bombing of the 16^th Street Baptist Church that church still can’t be a safe space for Black folks as evidenced by the shooting at Emanuel AME?

And after the election of America’s first Black president and all the hope for a post-racial America we saw after President Obama’s time in the White House, that the country has elected a president with a history of racial discrimination that is decades old?  That the country elected a man endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan?  That this same president-elect is trying to fill his cabinet with known racists … including one his wife Coretta wrote a letter on why he shouldn’t be appointed to a federal judgeship?  That we are turning over the White House and our government to a man who had the audacity to disrespect John Lewis, a man who marched and fought on the front lines with Dr. King time and time again for a better America and continues the fight to this very day?

What is this country coming to?

So on this day that is set aside to honor a great man, his legacy, and his dream for his country, I can’t help but feel sadness that we still have such a long way to go before the dream is realized.