February Marks 44th Anniversary of Historic Memphis Sanitation Strike | AFL-CIO NOW BLOG
Showing posts with label MLK. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MLK. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
MLK and Democratic Socialism
As we celebrate the MLK holiday on the anniversary of his birthday, let us reflect on how the legacy of King went behind civil rights for African-Americans and went to the core of the democratic socialist vision of freedom, justice & equality-political and economic as well as social. Dr. King not only spoke out against racism and racial inequality, but class inequality. He called for a redistribution of wealth. He opposed militarism and the Vietnam War. He supported the "war on poverty" along with socialists like DSA founder Michael Harrington, but was critical of the U.S. government, both Democrats and Republicans, for not going far enough to address the social problems of poverty and inequality in American society.
Martin Luther King, Economic Justice, Workers Rights, and Multiracial Democracy
Martin Luther King Jr. and the Road to Socialism
MLK Day: The Gulf Between Promise and Fulfillment
Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence
What Did MLK Say About War Costs?
The King They Won't Celebrate
The Revolutionary MLK
Report: Massive Movement Needed to fix "Perverse Concentration of Wealth"
MLK in his Own Words
Martin Luther King Jr. and the Road to Socialism
Monday, April 4, 2011
From Memphis to Madison-The Struggle Continues
From Memphis to Madison, The Struggle Continues
Forty-three years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, where he had traveled to support AFSCME sanitation workers striking for the right to collective bargaining. The struggle for workers' rights continues today in Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, New Hampshire, Michigan and other states throughout the country.
Join the Movement!
43rd Annual March Honoring MLK in Memphis April 4 2011
About 500 people representing several unions join the Memphis AFSCME Local to honor Dr. Martin Luther King on the 43rd Anniversary of his murder in Memphis Tennessee April 4, 1968.
MLK came to Memphis to stand WITH public workers and unions representing sanitation workers in Memphis. It was his last stand for justice and equality.
Sunday, January 16, 2011
MLK: Democratic Socialist
Even most conservatives now praise Dr. Martin Luther King as a good man who stood for equality and civil rights, etc. But MLK had a lot more to say than just judge people by the content of their character not by the color of their skin. He spoke truth to power--he stood for economic and social justice for everyone, not just racial equality. And he was an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War.
By 1967, King had become the country's most prominent opponent of the Vietnam War, and a staunch critic of overall U.S. foreign policy, which he deemed militaristic. In his "Beyond Vietnam" speech delivered at New York's Riverside Church on April 4, 1967 -- a year to the day before he was murdered -- King called the United States "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today."
Time magazine called the speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi," and the Washington Post declared that King had "diminished his usefulness to his cause, his country, his people."
While conservatives, even right-wing Tea Party leaders like Glenn Beck, claim to defend MLK's dream and legacy, the truth is MLK was what they would call a "Socialist." King called for CUTTING military spending, increasing social spending to END poverty, redistribution of wealth, and an end to U.S. militarism. King condemned the individualistic, selfish, greed that defines modern conservatism and the Tea Party movement. He would support a single-payer national health care system, not private insurance companies. He would support raising taxes on the rich to provide healthcare, education, etc. for the poor, not more tax cuts and austerity plans to roll back the New Deal and Great Society. He worked with and supported socialists and communists.
In fact, MLK challenged so much of the mainstream views of America, that you will not hear about any of that on the national MLK Holiday in the United States.
MLK: Democratic Socialist
When Public Workers Were Under Attack, MLK Stood with the Workers
Which Side Would MLK Be On?
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