http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/23732How Obama Betrays Reverend King's Philosophy of Nonviolence
January 27, 2010 By Jeff Nall
Source: Toward Freedom
Each year, many remember Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s work on behalf of civil rights. Yet the most fundamental piece of his philosophical legacy, his rejection of the utility and morality of violence between individuals and nations, remains at best ignorantly obscured or at worst actively suppressed. In his 1967 book, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, Rev. King wrote that "it is as possible and as urgent to put an end to war and violence between nations as it is to put an end to poverty and racial injustice."
When President Barack Obama received the Nobel Peace prize some in the peace movement noted the irony of awarding such a prize to a man overseeing multiple wars and hundreds of military bases around the world. What was most horrifying about Obama being awarded the peace prize was the content of his acceptance speech in which he defended the utility and morality of violence and war. Rather than merely ignoring the legacy of peacemakers before him, Obama used the speech as a full-frontal assault on the very philosophical tenets of nonviolence advocated by Gandhi and Rev. King.
On December 10, 2009, Obama followed in the footsteps of so many believers in war before him: letting out a cry for peace while loading his guns. In his Nobel Peace prize acceptance speech Obama said, "We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth that we will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes," said Obama. "There will be times when nations — acting individually or in concert — will find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified." Later in his speech Obama stated plainly that "the instruments of war do have a role to play in preserving the peace."
Rev. King directly assailed those who proffered words of peace and love while they showered their enemies with bullets and bombs. "Many men cry ‘Peace! Peace!' but they refuse to do the things that make for peace," wrote Rev. King. Summing up the philosophical tenet underwriting nonviolent direct action King continued: "One day we must come to see that peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek but a means by which we arrive at that goal." In short, peace is both the means as well as the end.
<edit>
The history Obama recognizes, however, is that cruel, blood-soaked fable of American Exceptionalism. Rev. King saw through this fraudulent cloak of Divine American Right when he observed, on April 4, 1967, that it was the United States that is "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today."
Rev. King was not being hyperbolic. He merely fulfilled the call of justice to look beyond national heritage and to honestly assess the actions of his country. And so his heart and mind followed our nation's long trail of blood; he simply opened his eyes to the way in which his own nation's military which was rapidly destroying human life in Vietnam—one million civilians; to the way in which it had killed more than two million civilians killed in the Korean war (American Foreign Relations, Clifford, 2000), and tens of thousands of civilians destroyed in bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
more...
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
