Our View: MLK remains relevant in this time and place

Tomorrow our nation will formally commemorate the birth of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who would have turned 93 on Saturday.

Especially for many younger Americans, it is easy to imagine that King belongs to a long-lost era in our history, though that is only partly true. He was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968, at the age of 39. We can’t forget, however, that if he not been gunned down Dr. King could still have been with us today.

He was born seven years after actress Betty White, who died just two weeks ago. He was born almost three years after Queen Elizabeth II, who still sits on the throne of the United Kingdom. He was born almost two years after actor Sidney Poitier, who died less than two weeks ago.

So yes, King might well have continued to fight for justice and equality right into our own times. And perhaps the nature of that fight would have looked much different had he survived and died a natural death at a ripe old age. So, too, might have Anne Frank, the Jewish teen who was born six months after King but died much earlier, at a Nazi concentration camp in 1945.

It is almost too painful to think of King and Frank living to tell their stories to millennial and Gen Z audiences. They almost certainly would have met at some point. Maybe we would have heard them speak at one of our local colleges or universities. They would have warned the world about the dangers of hatred and violence, and likely continued to preach non-violent resistance.

But hatred and violence claimed their lives far too soon. That, sadly, is one of the main reasons their lives and their messages remain relevant in our time. Living memories of these people will fade. It also seems, especially in recent years, that memories of the injustices they faced have faded as well. How else to explain the rise of Neo-Nazi groups and ideology not just in Europe, but among some right here in America? How else to explain that some right here in America refuse to acknowledge the endurance of systematic racism, sexism and antisemitism?

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, in 2020, women’s annual earnings were 82.3% of men’s, and the gap is even wider for many women of color. Though women only made 57 cents per dollar in 1973, “progress has stalled and we’re still far from closing the pay gap,” the DOL reports.

As the Society for Human Resource Management points out, nearly 60 years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 under Johnson, “we find equal pay for equal work is still not a reality,” and that Black and Hispanic workers, men and women, continue to earn less than their white counterparts.

And just three years ago, 11 people were killed and six more injured when a man who believed antisemitic conspiracy theories allegedly opened fire at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh. The suspect pleaded not guilty, and legal proceedings are far from over. It was the deadliest ever attack on Jews in the U.S., but only one of several in recent years.

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content their character.” So said King in his famed 1963 speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. In some ways we are closer to that reality. In many ways we still have far to go. And some people would want to see the progress of nearly 60 years reversed.

On Friday, The NAACP Diamond City Branch #2306 held a virtual tribute to King. The event, a prerecorded video played over Zoom, featured remarks from numerous members of the community, including Chapter president Jimel Calliste, Mayor George Brown, Judge Lesa Gelb, NAACP Vice President of Pennsylvania Youth & College Division Michael Jefferson, State Rep. Eddie Day Pashinski, and Congressman Matt Cartwright, and concluded with a recorded reading of Dr. King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech by former chapter president Ronald Felton from the Luzerne County Courthouse.

“My message to the kids and young adults of this community is to take this program and let it inspire you to go into your community and do some type of service in the name of Dr. King,” Jefferson said.

That would be our message as well. Keep the dream alive.

— Times Leader