The more that Dr. Martin Luther King is celebrated, the more difficult it is to remember what he really said and what he stood for. Michael Eric Dyson's book
I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr. is an invaluable resource in this respect. A speech by Dyson was part of a
Democracy Now! program that also includes King's speech, "The Drum major Instinct".
A PBS interview with Dyson (transcript) gets right to the heart of the matter. You can read King's words yourself at
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project, which includes
Beyond Vietnam,
Letter From Birmingham Jail,
March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom,
Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech, and
I've Been To The Mountaintop. Finally,
Martin Luther King: A Different Drum Major directly confronts conservative attempts to demean King's lofty sense of morality. If all this makes you want to do something to remember King's real legacy, you can
join the Mumia Contingent at the Martin Luther King Day Parade on Monday.
