Martin Luther King’s Best Speech Ever on the Vietnam War

[happy_liberal]

Excerpts from Martin Luther King’s speech
on the Vietnam War


"Now let me make it clear in the beginning, that I see this war as an unjust, evil and futile war. I preach to you today on the war in Vietnam because my conscience leaves me with no other choice. The time has come for America to hear the truth about this tragic war. In international conflicts the truth is hard to come by, because most nations are deceived about themselves. Rationalizations and the incessant search for scapegoats are the psychological cataracts that blind us to our sins.

But the day has passed for superficial patriotism. He who lives with untruth lives in spiritual slavery. Freedom is still the bonus we receive for knowing the truth. Ye shall know the truth, said Jesus, and the truth shall set you free...

I’ve chosen to preach about the war in vietnam today
because I agree with Dante,
that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who,
in a period of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.
There comes a time when silence is betrayal....

Since I am a preacher by trade, I suppose it is not surprising that I have seven major reasons for bringing Vietnam into the field of my moral vision. There is at the outset a very obvious and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam and the struggle I, and others, have been waging in America. A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor -- both black and white -- through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings.

Then came the buildup in Vietnam and I watched the program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such.

Perhaps the more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population.

We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools. So we watch them in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village, but we realize that they would never live on the same block in Detroit.

I could not be silent in the face of such cruel manipulation of the poor....

Let me say finally that I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America. I speak out against this war, not in anger, but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart. Above all, with a passionate desire to see our beloved country to stand as a moral example to the world.

I speak out against this war because I am disappointed with America. I am disappointed with our failure to deal positively and deal forthrightly with the triple evils of racism, economic exploitation and militarism. We are presently moving down a dead-end road that can lead to national disaster. America has strayed to the far country of racism and militarism. America has strayed away, this unnatural excursion has brought only confusion and bewilderment. It has left hearts aching with guilt and minds distorted with irrationality.

It is time for all people of conscience to call upon America to come back home. Come home America.








Listen to the audio and pass it on...

http://bit.ly/7xWwYZ

[Wilms]

1. Highly recommended. n/t

[happy_liberal]

2. thanks

:hi:

[classysassy]

3. Fast forward to the present

nothing has changed,wars no peace,greed,no peace,hate, no peace,new leaders same old game.

[happy_liberal]

4. this part scares me...

"I call on Washington today, I call on every man and woman of goodwill all over America today, I call on the young men of America who must make a choice today, to take a stand on this issue- tomorrow may be too late"

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[happy_liberal]

12. 40+ years ago "tomorrow may be too late"

Is it too late?

[suede1]

6. K & R.

[change_notfinetuning]

7. Does anyone doubt how proud he'd have been at the inauguration of

President Obama? Does anyone doubt how disappointed he'd be in the Obama administration at this point in time?

[happy_liberal]

8. I hear ya!

I so wish Obama would listen to this speech today and open his heart, there is no way to miss this message if you truly listen...







"How long shall they kill our prophets,
While we stand aside and look? "
Bob Marley

[happy_liberal]

9. that was strange

why was that comment deleted? It was civil and related...

[dana_b]

10. this part gets me too

"So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools. So we watch them in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village, but we realize that they would never live on the same block in Detroit."


I was watching msnbc and because of MLK day they had a poll regarding race relations in the U.S. and according to the poll 72% thought that race realations are okay although the breakdown showed that whites viewed it more positively than blacks/African Americans.

We send the poor to the wars because that they have few options. The neighborhoods are still divided and economic and social justice are a long way away for most. Have we learned any of the lessons that Dr. King taught us?

[happy_liberal]

11. "Have we learned any of the lessons that Dr. King taught us?"

not at all.