« Layers Upon Layers Of Fail |
Main
| Mark Sanford »
Clarification
22 Jun 2009 04:45 pm
It needs to be said that I think Martin Luther King--flaws and all--is a hero. I right write with the thought that most people reading this are following the conversation, and are familiar with the blog. That isn't obviously the case. The problem with thinking out loud, is that people hear you. And they may not have heard what you were thinking yesterday. I meant no disrespect to MLK. I wanted to point out the limits of idolizing. Nothing more. Nothing less.
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/mt-42/mt-tb.cgi/10454
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
I got it, and did not take it personally.
Now, can you dig up some juicy dirt on MY hero Malcolm? (joking)
Everything I've read says that, after converting, he was monk-like. I often wonder about his actual politics, more than his personal behavior. Like his attitude toward the "proper" place of women.
Yeah I think Malcolm felt he had to balance out all the wild memories and embarrassing dirt he engaged in prior to prison.
Thats cool and all, but I suspect the critiques were coming from the classic old-school "why are you airing our communities' dirty laundry to outsiders, making them and us look bad?" line of argument.
Yes, TNC sometimes forgets that white people read his blog!
Why does that matter?
I know the dirty laundry argument--Ive made it myself before--but if the thinking is clear and rigorous and sourced properly, truth is colorless no? I like the idea of countering the claim that Black folks are overly emotional and irrational and uncritical of their own thinking and behavior. We're actually deeply critical of ourselves, maybe even more than most.
What are you saying? That because I'm white I can't be just as critical of myself as a black person is of him/herself? Not cool, Juba, not cool.
??
These are the jokes, folks. ;)
I think especially with sexual vices you have put it in contexts. In MLK's case, his adultery says really nothing about his courage or convictions, in the same way Michael Jackson's issues says nothing about his ability as a performer.There are vices that can lay side-by-side with virtues without intersecting and exploding in dissonance.
Not to redo this, but the obvious problem here is that no one (at least no one writing here) really doubts his convictions or his courage.
Amen, TNC. Ever since I read some of Dyson's work on MLK, I've been on that real hero worship: know a man has flaws and take them seriously. Don't smooth them over or ignore them. Then take responsibility for the fact that that kind of greatness could come from you. That's scary type shit.
BTW: I think you meant to write, "I write with the thought..." I screw up with homophones all the time like that, e.g. "there" instead of "their." What is that? Is it some kind of brain thing?
Exactly. The idea that the Lord (or whatever Higher Power you reference, or even the mighty power of Circumstance) took a spoiled, bougie Atlanta playboy from a revered middle class family, who liked chasing girls more than hitting the books in college (his time with Howard Thurman aside), and made him into an American Ghandi is to me extremely motivating and powerful.
Much more than this exceptionalist narrative where he is born saintly and wise and destined to change the world without a speck on his garment.
Since I was raised Catholic, I have no problem saying that MLK was a saint. In Catholicism "saint" is not the opposite of "sinner", in fact the greatest Catholic Saints have been hyper-conscious of their own sinfulness. It's even more accurate to say that he was an old-school prophet of G-d -- another role for which personal purity is not a prerequisite.
FTW!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is probably a generational thing, but coming out of the hip-hop generation in the early 1990s, I always thought the general sentiment of my peers went basically:
MLK: sucka assimilationist
Malcom: no sellout
These were, of course, reductionist and, in the case of MLK, profoundly misguided, but my point is that the binary more or less tore down the lionization of MLK, less because of his personal foibles and more because young activist types thought his pacifism was soft.
My impression has been that for anyone who grew up with hip-hop, MLK was never as revered a figure as he might have been in older generations. In contrast, Malcolm X was practically untouchable prior to Spike Lee's film and became even more so after.
Isn't it kind of funny that you misspelled "write" in the first line of this post after mocking the way those idiots misspelled "conference" in your last post?
A conference on language isn't the same as a blog posting on it.
Nor is it the same as mocking someone for trying to better their English.
Nor is it the same as mocking someone for trying to better the discourse.
(looking @ you, MRein.)
Oh please. I'm not defending the folks TNC wrote about in the prior post. (I did call them idiots, after all.) And I see the humor in them misspelling "conference."
I just thought it was a funny coincidence. If you're going to correct other folks, you need to be careful yourself. (Wasn't that even sort of the point of TNC's original MLK post, albeit on a cosmically smaller scale?)
Sorry for lowering the discourse in a blog comments thread. I didn't even know that was possible.
This is true. But I think you missed the point of the post. They aren't wrong because they misspelled a word while correcting her. Indeed, there was no actual corrective action that they were offering. They're wrong because they misspelled a word while mocking her for trying to learn how to become a better speaker and speller.
The difference between me and them is I don't object to people trying to better their English. I am object to people mocking other people for trying to better their English.
"They aren't wrong because they misspelled a word while correcting her. Indeed, there was no actual corrective action that they were offering. They're wrong because they misspelled a word while mocking her for trying to learn how to become a better speaker and speller."
Actually, the idiots are wrong just for mocking her for trying to learn how to become a better speaker and speller. The fact that they misspelled a word is what makes it ironic.
The fact that you misspelled a word (actually used a homonym) is also ironic. But you seem to have misplaced your sense of irony.
Cf. Muphry's (sic) Law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skitt%27s_law. No getting around it.
Speaking of which: remove the final period from the url...
Sometimes I think we over-idolize people in order to make it easier for ourselves. If we were to admit that King was as flawed as the rest of us, we would lose a valuable excuse to do one tenth of what he did.
He's still the best American ever in my book.
TNC: You have successfully shattered my illusions. I’d assumed Martin Luther King was a saint, for what else was I t believe? Nonetheless, in revealing the contents of Hoover’s tape, I am unable to sleep. I am a gay man who tended to the care of my dying husband for two years. We were together for eight, but the last two were spent watching him die. I did not even masturbate, for it seemed a betrayal of him and I would not have it. Likewise, with my current husband (fuck ‘partner’ let’s get radical) I would as soon see myself castrated as to betray him. Yet the black community, with the support of the back church (holding up the very same bible used to defend their enslavement – oh yes, god was down with that) claim that I have not the right to marry while the mighty MLK was busy fucking some white woman, is just too large for my head to encompass. The hypocrisy. The ignorance. The cruelty and the brutality is beyond this simple faggot’s ability to understand. Meanwhile, I will wake up with my husband and I will hold him and all will be right with the universe for one hour each day while the sorry bible-beating motherfuckers spit and shit upon us in the name of Jesus. I think the Lord might have something very different to say.
MadeMark,
Don't be silly. "The black community" consists of a lot of different people with a lot of different opinions about marriage, and includes most of the D.C. city council that just voted to recognize and it includes the Reverend Wright who backed gay rights, and it includes TNC. If you have a problem with specific black churches name them. Painting all black people with the same brush is the exact kind of bigotry that I assume you would find appalling if applied to gay men.
Ditto. This blog is the black community, too.
I think its funny you are so angry at the Black community when we comprise what, 15 to 20% of the population? Seems to me you are picking on the easier mark and ignoring the 500 pound gorilla in the room--your own community.
TNC, I got it and you are correct, there was no disrespect to MLK. Just the comments let you know that's "Idolization" is the problem with the comments being posted. I see this sometime with anything to do with President Obama. I love the President, however I'm growing real worried about the people who disagree on maybe one issue with the President and everyone who "Idolizes" him gets so worked up, it's ridicules. I'm a Precinct Captain in my city that campaigned for the President since Jan 08 and I'm almost afraid to post this comment. Go figure
I think that if you dig down into the details of people's sex lives, you're going to find a lot of unflattering stuff. And sure, you can say, people who can't keep it together sexually shouldn't be in positions of leadership.
But if you do that, a lot of great leaders, who do essential things, get forced out of the game.
I don't care what MLK said when he was having sex. It doesn't mean anything. It seems unusually bad only because hardly anyone warrants the kind of attention MLK got -- if you watched secret tapes of everyone you knew, you'd see a lot o bad stuff.
My reaction to the existence of such a tape is simple: Hoover was a scumbag and a hypocrite.
MLK probably picked up his sexual habits when he was way under the radar. If you were a black pastor in segregated America, you probably didn't figure the FBI would be recording you. And I suspect the habit had become ingrained by the time he found his life's work.
I'm writing this because I think your core point is really wrong. This is what heroes look like. I mean, this guy, more than anyone, fits the bill. And he's got this sexual flaw that clashes with some people's theory about what a hero should be.
What I'm trying to say is that if the theory doesn't fit observed reality, then the theory is wrong. Sexuality isn't some morality play, it doesn't create yardsticks that can tell us if people are good or bad, except in very unusual circumstances.
I don't know if Mrs. King felt she got a bad deal being married to him. I hope not. But really, that's between them.
And I don't know if other people feel like they missed out on some really great, superior civil rights movement that we could have had, if only MLK had been a better man. I know that's dumb, and it's flippant, but that's the point. It falls apart if you say it out loud.
You wrote about Grant not too long ago. Middle of the civil war, the guy would go on three day benders, he'd be totally out of touch. But he did something a string of sober generals failed to do.
Real heroes are messy and complicated. Just like everyone else.
My previous "sorry, I will not stop worshipping MLK" post aside, I think you did a good thing by making people aware of his foibles. I think flawed heroes like MLK and Oskar Schindler are incredibly inspiring- they remind everybody that the fact that you aren't perfect doesn't mean you can't do great and brave things. That's important to people like decidedly non-perfect me. :)
so....
Eliot Spitzer, anyone?
Problem with Spitzer is he was locking folks up while breaking that same law at that very moment. Thats where he lost his shot at absolution politically.
I like my heros complicated and human. Think back to the models for heroism like odysseus. Flawed, human, extraordinary, and more than anything, resilient and in it for the long haul.
Whether the gay movement needs heros is an interesting question. My aunt and her partner living in the farm communities of a neighboring state teaching gym to high school and junior college girls, being field hockey coaches are heros to me. My parents friend Russel who carried a purse to church in the late sixties in Rochester New York seems like a hero. I think every family is full of gay heros back then and now.
I wish Obama and Michelle would do the right thing and speak up and be real but all my heros are flawed.