Thread by @coldxman

Many sum up MLK's views on race with the essay, "Letter to Birmingham Jail," where he rightly criticizes white moderates. But read all the sermons he gave, his essays, & books. You'll find dozens (& dozens) of examples of him framing CR movement in nonracial, universalist terms.

A few examples below.

As you read, consider how bizarre it would be to hear a #BLM
leader utter even one of these quotes.

"As I stand here and look out upon the thousands of negro faces, and the thousands of white faces, intermingled like the waters of a river, I see only one face––the face of the future."

"The important thing about man is...not the texture of his hair or the color of his skin but the quality of his soul"

"All men are one"

"All men are brothers"

"We need this movement. We need it to bring about a new kind of togetherness between blacks and whites."

“Racial segregation is a blatant denial of the unity which we have in Christ; for in Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile, bond nor free, Negro nor white.”

"Black supremacy is as dangerous as white supremacy, and God is not interested merely in the freedom of black men and brown men and yellow men. God is interested in the freedom of the whole human race"

"Any program that elects all black candidates because they are black, and rejects all white candidates simply because they are white is politically unsound and morally unjustifiable."

"The problem is not a purely racial one, with Negroes set against whites...it is not a struggle between people at all...Nonviolent resistance is not aimed against oppressors but against oppression. Under its banner consciences, not racial groups, are enlisted."

“Let us be dissatisfied until that day when nobody will shout 'White Power!'––when nobody will shout 'Black Power!'––but everybody will talk about God’s power and human power.”

"We do not wish to triumph over the white community. That would only result in transferring those now on the bottom to the top. But, if we can live up to nonviolence in thought and deed, there will emerge an interracial society based on freedom for all"

"What we need is a restless determination to make the ideal of brotherhood a reality in this nation and all over the world"

"As the human rights movement becomes more confident and aggressive...we will not ask our neighbor's color but whether he is a brother in the pursuit of racial justice"

"In an effort to achieve freedom...we must not try to leap from a position of disadvantage to one of advantage...Our aim must not be to defeat or humiliate the white man. We must not become victimized with a philosophy of black supremacy"

Ironically, many who point to "Letter from Birmingham" as a representative sample of MLK's rhetoric proceeded to accuse me of "cherry-picking" in my recent WSJ op-ed. As someone once said, that's not only not true, it's the opposite of the truth. /End

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