Why is there a double standard on revolutionaries?

[R_P_A_S]

I mainly referring to Emiliano Zapata vs Che Guevara.

I find it strange that my older relatives like aunts and uncles frown on me for liking Che but love the fact that I also like Zapata. (We are Mexican)

They call Che a mad man and a murder. But Zapata is a national hero. I wonder if Zapata had lived to be 50 or something and his revolutionary ideal hadn't been treason if my relatives would feel the same way?

The mexican government loves to decorate Zapata and Villa as national heroes. But is this same government that had a hand in their murders and betraying the original ideal of the Mexican Revolution. I guess the system loves the idea and dream of a hero and fulfills the people's desire by romanticizing such figures but once one of these revolutionaries gets too close for comfort they deem them as dangerous and evil communist!

I sometimes wonder if Fidel had failed in Cuba.. Let's say after 5 or 6 months of the Cuban Revolution initial triumph he was killed and the entire movement defeated.. I wonder if the Miami Mafia would honor him and recognize him as a fighter for Cuban freedom and what not.. But since he won and has been in power for over 50 years he is demonized..

hmmmm..

[graymouser]

Lenin, in the opening lines of The State and Revolution, explains it:


What is now happening to Marx's theory has, in the course of history, happened repeatedly to the theories of revolutionary thinkers and leaders of oppressed classes fighting for emancipation. During the lifetime of great revolutionaries, the oppressing classes constantly hounded them, received their theories with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. After their death, attempts are made to convert them into harmless icons, to canonize them, so to say, and to hallow their names to a certain extent for the “consolation” of the oppressed classes and with the object of duping the latter, while at the same time robbing the revolutionary theory of its substance, blunting its revolutionary edge and vulgarizing it.
There is of course another twist. The more successful, the more monstrous - so Che who succeeded in Cuba and died in Bolivia is edgy, while Lenin is simply beyond the pale.

[R_P_A_S]

Lenin, in the opening lines of The State and Revolution, explains it:


There is of course another twist. The more successful, the more monstrous - so Che who succeeded in Cuba and died in Bolivia is edgy, while Lenin is simply beyond the pale.

you are right! I remember reading this also! thanks for reminded me!

[GPDP]

This even applies to less radical figures such as Martin Luther King. MLK is revered universally (even by the far-right, in their own twisted way), much like an idol, yet were he alive today, saying the things he was saying near the end of his life, he'd be universally demonized even by the bleeding-heart liberals who so adore him. I can even see Obama, who names MLK as his greatest hero, publicly denouncing him for calling the U.S. the "greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." Yet we hear none of that, because the man we worship is a whitewashed, sanitized version of who he really was.

Malcom X couldn't be sanitized like MLK was, so we mostly downplay him and talk about how much of an extremist he was.

[Palingenisis]

Its the same in Ireland....James Connolly and "Big" Jim Larkin (who actually corresponded with Left Communists!) were considered and are considered okay by the same type of reactionary who burnt down Communist bookshops in the 30s and early 70s.

[graymouser]

Malcom X couldn't be sanitized like MLK was, so we mostly downplay him and talk about how much of an extremist he was.
I happened to catch a piece on NPR a couple weeks back talking about The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and as essential reading as I think that book is*, its legacy has blunted a lot of the radical edge of Malcolm's ideas in his last year of life. He's become more of a "prison" icon than the revolutionary hero that he really was.

* If you live in the US and haven't read it, you have no excuse. Go out, buy a copy, and don't come back until you're finished.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Yeah, in the US, MLK is a prime example of this phenomena: all his radical edges are smoothed and his collaborationist and liberal ideas are promoted to the point that this liberal but sincere movement figure is used to promote the racist ideas of the US being a color-blind society now... or that Glenn Beck can claim that he is in MLK's tradition when MLK was far to the left of Beck's current "socialist" boogymen like Obama and Clinton.

I think Gramsci is another example - he's studied in most US universities, but the driving force behind his ideas, his socialism and Bolshevism, is treated as a footnote to his philosophical contributions. Even Marx is respectable as a historical analysis of economics - but the "self-emancipation of the working class" stuff is downplayed.

[graymouser]

Yeah, in the US, MLK is a prime example of this phenomena: all his radical edges are smoothed and his collaborationist and liberal ideas are promoted to the point that this liberal but sincere movement figure is used to promote the racist ideas of the US being a color-blind society now... or that Glenn Beck can claim that he is in MLK's tradition when MLK was far to the left of Beck's current "socialist" boogymen like Obama and Clinton.
Any radicalism we ascribe to MLK has to be viewed in context to some extent. I mean, he made a few positive comments about socialism, but his actual associations were almost exclusively with members of the rightward-moving Norman Thomas Socialist Party. King also clashed sharply with black revolutionaries in SNCC and CORE when he worked with them. He was certainly evolving into a principled social democrat, which we should say honestly, but let me put it this way - he'd be Restricted on this forum.

[fa2991]

It's in the best interest of the bourgeoisie for the public to have safe "heroes" and "revolutionaries" to sink all their hopes into. If they're always looking up at someone, they don't look around and analyze their own situations. Why would a leftist figure ever be allowed to gain ground? This should show how much effort goes into capitalist's gross hero manufacturing:
http://www.travelkat.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Mount-Rushmore.jpg

[Jimmie Higgins]

Any radicalism we ascribe to MLK has to be viewed in context to some extent. I mean, he made a few positive comments about socialism, but his actual associations were almost exclusively with members of the rightward-moving Norman Thomas Socialist Party. King also clashed sharply with black revolutionaries in SNCC and CORE when he worked with them. He was certainly evolving into a principled social democrat, which we should say honestly, but let me put it this way - he'd be Restricted on this forum.Yes, as I said, he was a liberal. But opposition to war and his later leftward shift put him on the very left of liberalism - these positions put him on the outs with the Democrats and establishment liberals who he thought were his allies and are also the political parts of his legacy that are "whitewashed" today.

[Magón]

I mainly referring to Emiliano Zapata vs Che Guevara.

I find it strange that my older relatives like aunts and uncles frown on me for liking Che but love the fact that I also like Zapata. (We are Mexican)

They call Che a mad man and a murder. But Zapata is a national hero. I wonder if Zapata had lived to be 50 or something and his revolutionary ideal hadn't been treason if my relatives would feel the same way?

The mexican government loves to decorate Zapata and Villa as national heroes. But is this same government that had a hand in their murders and betraying the original ideal of the Mexican Revolution. I guess the system loves the idea and dream of a hero and fulfills the people's desire by romanticizing such figures but once one of these revolutionaries gets too close for comfort they deem them as dangerous and evil communist!

I sometimes wonder if Fidel had failed in Cuba.. Let's say after 5 or 6 months of the Cuban Revolution initial triumph he was killed and the entire movement defeated.. I wonder if the Miami Mafia would honor him and recognize him as a fighter for Cuban freedom and what not.. But since he won and has been in power for over 50 years he is demonized..

hmmmm..

Well Zapata and Villa are considered to be hero's because of their work on helping the Mexican people rise up against their government, etc. You and I know the story, heard it thousands of times before, so it's not wonder the Mexican people see them as good guys. It's like how Bolivar is admired in South America, and George Washington up here in the US. So people look up to Zapata and Villa as national hero's, while Che is just a radical outsider to the Mexican people, who fought with Castro in Cuba. Sure he stayed there for a bit, but he did nothing for the people of Mexico as far as I know, and many probably don't like him or don't care about him really. That's how it seems to be with some of my family anyway, with them not caring about him.

[RedTrackWorker]

Yes, as I said, he was a liberal. But opposition to war and his later leftward shift put him on the very left of liberalism - these positions put him on the outs with the Democrats and establishment liberals who he thought were his allies and are also the political parts of his legacy that are "whitewashed" today.

Why was he moving left? The mass movement. But how was he moving left? To coopt the movement--the Poor People's Campaign. You can read his last book and it's not hard to read between the lines that he's basically telling the liberals:
"Look, guys, we have to do better than this. The masses are waking up and getting out of hand. We have to do better to keep them under control."
If you disagree, then tell me why the Poor People's campaign was being organized through the SCLC and preachers rather than groups like CORE and SNCC (and King was frustrated with the preachers' inability to effectively mobilize!)? The answer is obvious: he wanted a controlled demonstration doing a morality play in D.C., not an actual self-organized group of "poor people" taking militant action.
Yeah, he said some things then that Obama wouldn't like now, but given his evolution and pedigree, there's no real reason to think he'd be saying those things now. Look at Jesse Jackson and Andrew Young. Hell, look at many of the people from the far more genuinely radical SNCC, such as John Lewis.
The sanitizing of MLK is not always contradictory to the legacy he was trying to leave, which is why I completely disagree with the ISO's various attempts to claim King's legacy (such as here: http://socialistworker.org/2003-1/441/441_08_MLK.shtml). I say, "Let them have King's legacy, I'll take Malcolm's!" (And I think it says a lot that they take King's words as good coin when there's ample evidence in action he wasn't moving to the "left" in a working-class direction.)

[Rainsborough]

Forgive my ignorance here, but I thought that Castro was happy to see the back of Che following the success of the revolution. It is also said that Castro may have had a small part in his death.

[graymouser]

Yes, as I said, he was a liberal. But opposition to war and his later leftward shift put him on the very left of liberalism - these positions put him on the outs with the Democrats and establishment liberals who he thought were his allies and are also the political parts of his legacy that are "whitewashed" today.
The ISO, Socialist Alternative, and the Socialist Party USA have all tried to "reclaim" the King legacy in various ways (this (http://www.isreview.org/issues/58/feat-MLK.shtml) is a good example for the ISO) - but this shift has to be looked at in context. King wound up moving left just to stay on the right wing of the Black radicalization of the '60s. We should not be coy about this and we must be honest with ourselves and with others. King represented a stage that the Black liberation movement outgrew, publicly and visibly, in the debates around SNCC and CORE and the trajectory of Malcolm X. Trying to "reclaim" this legacy means either whitewashing the other way - around his right-wing position in the movement - and not learning from more consistent radicals within this history, or moving rightward toward what King really represented, a civil rights based compromise with the liberal establishment.

[R_P_A_S]

Well Zapata and Villa are considered to be hero's because of their work on helping the Mexican people rise up against their government, etc. You and I know the story, heard it thousands of times before, so it's not wonder the Mexican people see them as good guys. It's like how Bolivar is admired in South America, and George Washington up here in the US. So people look up to Zapata and Villa as national hero's, while Che is just a radical outsider to the Mexican people, who fought with Castro in Cuba. Sure he stayed there for a bit, but he did nothing for the people of Mexico as far as I know, and many probably don't like him or don't care about him really. That's how it seems to be with some of my family anyway, with them not caring about him.

True! But if Zapata and Villa had lived longer they would of been those inconvenient "commies" Zapata was a border line anarchist and his "Plan of Ayala" wasn't really up to par with Madero who he helped become President so that he would later betray him an set him up.

[Magón]

True! But if Zapata and Villa had lived longer they would of been those inconvenient "commies" Zapata was a border line anarchist and his "Plan of Ayala" wasn't really up to par with Madero who he helped become President so that he would later betray him an set him up.

Sure, but there's also the fact that that time in Mexican History, everyone was backstabbing and getting backstabbed in politics. (Still is in some cases, but not like back then.) I think that's one of the reasons, if not the most influential reason, the Mexican people have a hard time trusting their leaders. There's a long history of the leader getting knocked off by a close friend, and then that guy getting knocked off after taking power.

[fa2991]

Forgive my ignorance here, but I thought that Castro was happy to see the back of Che following the success of the revolution. It is also said that Castro may have had a small part in his death.

Nah, he didn't. Some people just think he didn't send enough aid, which they think is the same as killing him.

[Imposter Marxist]

Forgive my ignorance here, but I thought that Castro was happy to see the back of Che following the success of the revolution. It is also said that Castro may have had a small part in his death.

In History's Che section this is disproven in one of the threads, you'll know it when you see it.

[Jimmie Higgins]

The ISO, Socialist Alternative, and the Socialist Party USA have all tried to "reclaim" the King legacy in various ways (this (http://www.isreview.org/issues/58/feat-MLK.shtml) is a good example for the ISO) - but this shift has to be looked at in context.Well first, no one here is arguing that he was a radical and to hold him to the standards that we would hold a Marxist or anarchists radical is missing the point in my opinion. He was liberal in outlook but the course of history led him to confront the limits of liberalism and helped him draw conclusions that were increasingly left in perspective. That's significant. Today, liberal movement leaders (even the sincere ones) can not see beyond the boundaries of official liberalism and if Democrats or liberal allies tell them not to do something or to be quiet during an election or whatever, generally they do not put up a fight.

Undoubtedly MLK was able start going beyond the limits of establishment liberalism because there was a large radical movement challenging his ideas from the left and creating a atmosphere where movement figures had to decide if they were going to side with the process of those in power or look to the streets. Many from the first phase of the civil rights movement who saw the struggle mainly in middle class terms (the need for access to the same things the white middle class can access - good education, nice hospitals and professions and so on) were happy to stick with the official liberal process of ... wait, wait, someday there will be an end to DOMA - I mean there will be card-check - I mean universal health care - er and end to legally sanctioned racism. These figures are forgotten now because they were simply the lame-ass establishment kind of liberal leader we are all more familiar with and irrelevant to history.

While MLK certainty had his illusions, he also confronted the limits of liberalism in a real way. While Malcolm X was fantastic at exposing liberals and their complicity in a corrupt system, MLK's experience shows in practice how liberalism plays out and how what Malcolm was saying was correct. If MLK were merely trying to co-op the movement, there would have been no need for him to talk about Vietnam when it caused him to loose the support and backing of his rich and connected liberal "allies" connected to the Democratic party.

No the people trying to co-opt the movement were the people saying that voting for good liberal Democrats is enough and that moving too quickly will cause racist backlash.


King wound up moving left just to stay on the right wing of the Black radicalization of the '60s. So you are criticizing him for not becoming a socialist revolutionary? Fine, he was not a revolutionary - but he is still significant if you want to talk about fighting oppression in the US. His lessons and the ways he won reforms as well as came into roadblocks due to the nature of capitalism and liberalism are what I think NEED to be reclaimed from the Glenn Beck's who say that MLK was about how Christian values helped black people overcome racism, or the Democratic politicians who say MLK's legacy is making speeches that appealed to the "better angels" of the white people in power.

If what they say is the end of the story, then, yes, we should wipe MLK from our minds as anything other than just another liberal. However, I think there are many things that his experiences can help show us about how reforms work and don't work in the US and the limits of "liberal allies" and so on. This story of the flailing MLK who couldn't figure out why he was becoming irrelevant to working class blacks in cities and how he began to see that racism in the north was caught up in the system... these things do need to be "reclaimed".


We should not be coy about this and we must be honest with ourselves and with others.Are you implying that I am being deceitful. That really pisses me off in what is otherwise an interesting side-discussion. I'm going to take that as a rehtorical flourish, but really, if you disagree, fine, just don't imply that I am "hiding my politics" or trying to "trick" people.


King represented a stage that the Black liberation movement outgrew, publicly and visibly, in the debates around SNCC and CORE and the trajectory of Malcolm X. Yes and realizing that his liberal illusions were falling of deaf ears, MLK began to rethink his assumptions and that's when he began to see that the oppression of blacks in urban areas was also class based, not just a set of easily identifiable laws that effect all classes of one ethnic group in a fairly similar way. I think this is what begins to separate MLK from general liberals then and now.

Had King not begun to challenge the more systemic roots of racism in class and imperialism (though I don't think he saw them in these terms - probably just "poverty" and "war") then he would have been a much lesser historical figure and this is why the establishment right and left have tried so hard to freeze MLK in time at the March in Washington (where he was most certainly in full liberal and containing the movement mode).


Trying to "reclaim" this legacy means either whitewashing the other way - around his right-wing position in the movement - and not learning from more consistent radicals within this history, or moving rightward toward what King really represented, a civil rights based compromise with the liberal establishment.Yes, this is where he began, but not where he ended up. He shifted to the left just as Malcolm X shifted to the left. Malcolm, one of my personal heroes by the way was not a socialist and his early positions were just as off as MLK's liberal illusions were - but like MLK, the movement and the debates and challenges it raised caused him to shift and at the end of his life he was questioning the relationship of racism and the system in the US.

Malcolm X to the end wanted to have a class collaborationist approach to organizing, he did not see the (black) working class as a major player or the people to be organized to fight racism. So just because Malcolm was more overtly militant does not necessarily mean he was always closer to radicalism than the parts of the civil rights movement that did have illusions in the Democrats and liberals. Malcolm in the NOI didn't even believe that it was worth it to protest or mobilize people to do anything other than "pull their communities up by their bootstraps". Just as the struggle at that time tested MLK's illusions in the liberals, the struggle challenged Malcolm to confront the limits of the NOI's petty-bourgeois illusions in self-reliance, black-owned businesses and an overt rejection of political activism against oppression.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Yeah, he said some things then that Obama wouldn't like now, but given his evolution and pedigree, there's no real reason to think he'd be saying those things now. Look at Jesse Jackson and Andrew Young. Hell, look at many of the people from the far more genuinely radical SNCC, such as John Lewis.


The sanitizing of MLK is not always contradictory to the legacy he was trying to leave, which is why I completely disagree with the ISO's various attempts to claim King's legacy (such as here:
http://socialistworker.org/2003-1/441/441_08_MLK.shtml). Here I'll break the article down for you


King founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) as an alternative to national organizations like the NAACP that insisted on a purely legal strategy for civil rights. The SCLC was committed to mass mobilization. King put forward a new model for organizing, based on nonviolent direct action.So the right-wing of the civil rights movement at this time was actually the people who wanted to go through the courts and legal process and the left were the ones who wanted to organize actions and make demands on power. It's not radical, it's full of illusions in the liberals and the system, but it is the LEFT of the movement at this point.



The principles of nonviolence became the watchword for civil rights activists across the South. But as the movement developed--particularly in the early 1960s, with a new wave of civil rights organizing led by Black college students, united in the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)--King's strategy gradually came into question.


For one thing, King's principle of nonviolence couldn't be sustained in the face of the Southern establishment's savage violence. In practice, activists recognized the need for armed self-defense, while using nonviolent direct action as a tactic to build the struggle.


Moreover, King's stated goal was to use mass mobilizations--often counting on the violence of Southern authorities to gain media attention--to embarrass the northern wing of the Democratic Party and force it to act for civil rights. But Democrats like John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson were openly hostile to the movement, because they didn't want to offend Southern Dixiecrats.


King found himself caught in the middle, increasingly acting as a brake on the movement for fear of offending Democrats in Washington. So at the famous 1963 March on Washington--now remembered mainly for his "I Have a Dream" speech--King, at the request of the Kennedy White House, played the central role in toning down the demonstration and censoring a fiery speech planned by SNCC leader John L. Lewis.


...


IT'S IMPOSSIBLE to say how King would have answered these questions had he lived longer. The SCLC's plans for a Poor People's Campaign, for example, still reflected King's strategy of pressuring Democratic Party politicians.


But there's certainly no comparison with the harmless picture of King that we get 35 years later. "Our only hope today," King said in 1967, "lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism and militarism."


To socialists, that sounds a lot like our own call to action--and it's why we claim Martin Luther King as an inspiration in our struggle for a new society.

The argument isn't that MLK was without illusions and bad politics or that he was in any way a socialist, but that he was a sincere reformist moving leftward in his life and these are the facts that the mainstream whitewashes in a sanitized version of him they present to us in order to dissuade us from thinking that things like race and class matter any more.


I say, "Let them have King's legacy, I'll take Malcolm's!" (And I think it says a lot that they take King's words as good coin when there's ample evidence in action he wasn't moving to the "left" in a working-class direction.)How many picket lines did Malcolm go to?

So you want your legacy to be rejecting the working class in favor of a class-collaborationist approach of all oppressed people? If we take a snapshot of NOI Malcolm as people tend to take a snapshot of MLK at the March in Washington and base our assessment of him there, then pretty much he is a good critic of liberalism and the flaws in the civil rights movement, but otherwise he is merely an excellent propagandist for his church. It's the dynamics of his development that make Malcolm - and King important figures with a lot to show us despite neither of them being socialists or anarchist radicals.

[RedTrackWorker]

Jimmie Higgins disappointed me. I have a low opinion of the ISO's politics but his posts stood out to me as being insightful. But in his reply to me (and graymouser), he misses the point.

The quote that he forgot to defend from the ISO article in question, the one that relates directly to what I was talking about is:

To socialists, that sounds a lot like our own call to action--and it's why we claim Martin Luther King as an inspiration in our struggle for a new society.

Higgins writes:

The argument isn't that MLK was without illusions and bad politics or that he was in any way a socialist, but that he was a sincere reformist moving leftward in his life

So the statements of "sincere reformists" sound "a lot like [y]our own call to action"? Lest you say I'm just playing with words, let's look at this again. The ISO article ends with the quote above. I challenge it (as does Graymouser challenge their line). Higgins defends their position expressed in an article called "The Real MLK" which ends by claiming MLK's words sound like the ISO's and Higgins' defense is that it's "just" about MLK being distorted in the media. But that's not what the article says! It says MLK sounds like their own call to action and claims him as an inspiration to the struggle!

Then Higgins just slanders me and the LRP:

So you want your legacy to be rejecting the working class in favor of a class-collaborationist approach of all oppressed people? If we take a snapshot of NOI Malcolm as people tend to take a snapshot of MLK at the March in Washington and base our assessment of him there

I was clearly talking about the MLK of 67-68, so that's a straw man argument that I'm taking a snapshot of 63 MLK. To say I support X's class-collaboration because I claim his legacy is slander and it's just that simple. Claiming his legacy does not mean I'm claiming his program, particularly that of his NOI days!

And let's keep it going. The ISR article graymouser linked to is a dozy!
http://www.isreview.org/issues/58/feat-MLK.shtml

Nonviolence, King believed, was not just morally superior as a means of change, but strategically superior. In a debate with the self-defense advocate Robert Williams, King wrote, regarding the advocacy of violence as a tool of advancement:


There are incalculable perils in this approach. It is not the danger or sacrifice of physical being which is primary, though it cannot be contemplated without a sense of deep concern for human life. The greatest danger is that it will fail to attract Negroes to a real collective struggle, and will confuse the large uncommitted middle group, which as yet has not supported either side.

Setting aside the question of nonviolence as a principle, King’s words foretell the strategic cul-de-sac in which many radicals found themselves after his death.


Here's one thing I really dislike about the ISO: they often refuse to take clear positions. For instance, the above reads to me as if Brian Jones is arguing that the rejection of nonviolence was the reason that the Black movement found itself blocked. I think that's seven kinds of fucked up, but--and we'll see--there's enough weasel room that someone like Higgins can somewhat plausibly say, "No, no, that's not what he meant."
But to take the writing at face value, here is my reply: Robert Williams in the Carolinas and the Deacons for Defense in Louisiana had demonstrated in practice, before 1968 and well before Jones's article, that organized and armed self-defense centered on the Black working-class was not only possible and effective, but at least sometimes, the only effective recourse (see Lance Hill's book on the Deacons). Hill's book (and Williams's writing) also shows how the "nonviolent" strategy drove away the working class (especially older males) from participating in the movement.
There is a legacy that links Williams' self-defense group, the Deacons and Malcolm. And the connection of MLK to that legacy is one of opposition. I know where I stand.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Jimmie Higgins disappointed me.Did I forget your birthday again?:lol:

Ok, I think you are missing the forest for the trees and you seem more interested in arguing about what you see as "the ISO's bad politics" rather than the issue at hand of weather MLK was simply a liberal attempting to co-opt and contain the radicalizing movement (as claimed earlier in some of the threads) or if he was actually a liberal/reformer being radicalized by the movement (as I claim).

Now what are you arguing with this last post?

Are you saying the ISO is in favor of non-violence in principle? The articles quoted make it obviously clear that we do not. Please don't use inuedno, if you think the ISO supports non-violence on principle, state it and back it up.

Are you saying that the ISO is a liberal organization when the articles repeatedly point out the limitations of liberalism? Again, back it up and don't beat around the bush.


The quote that he forgot to defend from the ISO article in question, the one that relates directly to what I was talking about is:

To socialists, that sounds a lot like our own call to action--and it's why we claim Martin Luther King as an inspiration in our struggle for a new society.
Why are you taking on single lines from the text, removed from their context, rather than the basic argument of the text which is the same one I have been arguing and have restated above?

Here's the full 3 paragraph conclusion again:

IT'S IMPOSSIBLE to say how King would have answered these questions had he lived longer. The SCLC's plans for a Poor People's Campaign, for example, still reflected King's strategy of pressuring Democratic Party politicians.

But there's certainly no comparison with the harmless picture of King that we get 35 years later. "Our only hope today," King said in 1967, "lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism and militarism."

To socialists, that sounds a lot like our own call to action--and it's why we claim Martin Luther King as an inspiration in our struggle for a new society.


So the statements of "sincere reformists" sound "a lot like [y]our own call to action"?
Yes THIS statement from THIS sincere reformist sounds like a socialist call to action. If it doesn't sound like your call to action are you pro-war, pro-inequality and pro-racism? Here I'll break it down:

This statement: "Our only hope today," King said in 1967, "lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism and militarism."

"...sounds a lot like our own call to action--and it's why we claim Martin Luther King as an inspiration"

I'm sorry if the SW article was poorly written and too hard to understand.


Lest you say I'm just playing with words, let's look at this again. The ISO article ends with the quote above. I challenge it (as does Graymouser challenge their line). Higgins defends their position expressed in an article called "The Real MLK" which ends by claiming MLK's words sound like the ISO's and Higgins' defense is that it's "just" about MLK being distorted in the media. But that's not what the article says! It says MLK sounds like their own call to action and claims him as an inspiration to the struggle!First, if you are debating me, it's OK to use the second person rather than saying "Higgins" says as if you are at a coalition meeting trying to denounce the ISO to a crowed based on something I said. It's weird when someone only talks to you in the 3rd person.

Anyway, you keep harping on induvidual lines, but you don't seem to grasp the argument of the article as a whole. Can you summarize it for me? I didn't re-read the whole thing.

What is the opening: the ruling class claims MLK and presents a sanitized version of his political legacy.

What is the content: while coming from a liberal perspective, changes in the movement led him to challenge this at times even if not decisively. This is the part I skimmed this time around because I've read more in depth things and I think I know the basic argument being made.

Conclusion: What MLK stood for and fought for are actually closer to what socialists fight for than the "clean" version we get of MLK today.

So it's the same basic argument I have been trying to make and I think the article does a nice brief take on some of the dynamics going on around MLK in the civil rights movement. Every criticism people here have made about MLK's failings was at least touched upon in this article from his looking to pressure the Democrats to illusions in liberals, to the shortcomings of his non-violence (which honestly this article just glances over that debate, but the SW frequently has articles about why radicals should not see nonviolence as a principle), so it's really back to the original question - did he move to the left just to co-opt the movement?

I have seen plenty of evidence that MLK was a liberal as I have argued he was... but I have not seen sufficient evidence that MLK consistently sought to co-opt the civil rights movement and that he only went to the left in order to corral the movement back into the arms of the liberals.

Should he be condemned by radicals or recognized as an significant figure in the civil rights movement who was moving to the left politically? Is he whitewashed by the ruling class or do they present him as he always really was?

[graymouser]

Are you implying that I am being deceitful. That really pisses me off in what is otherwise an interesting side-discussion. I'm going to take that as a rehtorical flourish, but really, if you disagree, fine, just don't imply that I am "hiding my politics" or trying to "trick" people.
No, I am 100% not implying that you are being deceitful. I just think the ISO's approach to this question "bends the stick" in the direction of King's radicalism to a degree I am uncomfortable with, as do the approaches of Socialist Alternative and the Socialist Party. King took some fairly important steps in his last year, but was unwilling to go over the gulf that separated him at that point from the best fighters in the Black liberation movement.

I'll respond to the rest later, I just thought this required an answer.

[Jimmie Higgins]

King took some fairly important steps in his last year, but was unwilling to go over the gulf that separated him at that point from the best fighters in the Black liberation movement.And I don't disagree with that, but that is still not proof of "co-opting" the movement. Nor is it proof that he really was merely the naive liberal talking only about non-violence that the media today and many liberals try to make him out to be and so his history is not at all whitewashed.

[RedTrackWorker]

In reply to Jimmie Higgins, you convinced me that you are making a serious attempt to have a real discussion. I respect that and will try to act likewise. I overreacted in my last post on this thread and used the word "slander" when it was unwarranted and JH, instead of turning up the heat in the conversation, dealt with it through a PM. Respect.

But I still strongly disagree with...you. (JH, in his post and PM, suggested it was weird I was debating him in the third person. I'm just throwing this out there because I'm new to this particular forum, but it feels weird to me to do the opposite but I'll try it out at his request in this thread.)

On the issue of the "MLK's call sounds like our call." I knew the MLK quote the article was referring to and had it in mind. I just did not quote it in my reply.
Here's where I'm coming from, to step back a bit:
I've been studying again the struggle to build the Fourth International in the 30's. One of the more significant (and arguably successful) maneuvers was the fusion (not entry) of the Trotskyists in the U.S. with the American Workers' Party led by Muste. Some said, "But the program of XYZ grouping is closer to ours than that of the AWP and is not program key?" The reply was along the lines of: "Program is key, yes, but in building an organization we evaluate the groupings based on their history and trajectory. The AWP represents a movement. Centrist, yes, but healthy and growing. These other groups (like Gitlow) are ossified bureaucracies, not a movement."
And I also think of the break with the centrists in the Third International, people like Kautsky and Hugo Haase.
These various centrist groupings have words and programs that sounds far, far closer to the LRP's call for socialism than anything King every said and I would never, never quote them and say, "Sounds like us."
Is this just a personal thing? A matter of style?
Let's look at the King quote:

"Our only hope today," King said in 1967, "lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism and militarism."

Poverty, racism, militarism. While one cannot have capitalism without those things, that does not mean being against them means you are for overthrowing the capitalist system--a struggle against them can be confined to reforms, "revolutionary spirit" not withstanding. It is not an accident, I don't think, that King in that final year based himself organizationally on the preachers still, whereas there's evidence that Malcolm's political organization he was building was mostly working-class--and that four years earlier when it would have been more difficult.
When King met the Memphis strikers, he was very demoralized and their energy led him to get carried away and advocate a general strike in Memphis. But it snowed that day and shut the city down--so God called the general strike I guess. But the real point that I've seen no one make is: King didn't organize it for another day--or for that matter, in other cities. The speech that night is one of the most amazing speeches I've ever seen in my life, perhaps the most actually. They sure don't make liberals like they used to.
But is King "merely" a liberal or a liberal being radicalized in 1968? In one sense, the question cannot be answered 100% posed as such.
But I will repeat an earlier question about the Poor People's March: King was frustrated with the inability and unresponsiveness of preachers to mobilize the "poor" for this march. If he was radicalizing, why did he not call on groups like SNCC, CORE and the myriad local, "grassroots" Black groups developing across the country to organize for the march? I mean, he was frustrated with his base of organizers--and there's whole other layers of organizers he knows...and he doesn't do it. I think the answer comes down to class. He was a reformist and the system at that point needed "radical" reformists. He played that role well and could not have played it by using those other groups to organize the march.

On the nonviolence thing, I must not have been clear because I'm not saying the ISO favors nonviolence in principle but that the article at best leaves the door open to favoring it strategically. What do you think Jones means by saying "Setting aside the question of nonviolence as a principle, King’s words foretell the strategic cul-de-sac in which many radicals found themselves after his death." The words in question are from a debate with Robert Williams, who successfully organized armed self-defense to defend Black people from the Klan, and Jones says King's "words" against that "foretell the strategic cul-de-sac".

[Ocean Seal]

Lenin, in the opening lines of The State and Revolution, explains it:


There is of course another twist. The more successful, the more monstrous - so Che who succeeded in Cuba and died in Bolivia is edgy, while Lenin is simply beyond the pale.


What is now happening to Marx's theory has, in the course of history, happened repeatedly to the theories of revolutionary thinkers and leaders of oppressed classes fighting for emancipation. During the lifetime of great revolutionaries, the oppressing classes constantly hounded them, received their theories with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. After their death, attempts are made to convert them into harmless icons, to canonize them, so to say, and to hallow their names to a certain extent for the “consolation” of the oppressed classes and with the object of duping the latter, while at the same time robbing the revolutionary theory of its substance, blunting its revolutionary edge and vulgarizing it.
Yes this has been true for a while. They have done this a lot. Not only to Zapata, but to the Spanish Revolution (notice how they never teach about Anarchist Catalonia), to the radical abolitionist movement, to Jesus, and to Debs. Its almost sickening that they will declare some revolts monstrous and praise others while perverting their intentions.

[Jimmie Higgins]

But I still strongly disagree with...you.Me?:D


(JH, in his post and PM, suggested it was weird I was debating him in the third person. I'm just throwing this out there because I'm new to this particular forum, but it feels weird to me to do the opposite but I'll try it out at his request in this thread.)No sweat. I guess if there were a lot of people in this discussion it wouldn't be weird to me, but since it's basically just the 3 of us discussing this point it just seem strange, but other people do that on this site too, so I guess it's just personal preference and style.


Here's where I'm coming from, to step back a bit:
I've been studying again the struggle to build the Fourth International in the 30's. One of the more significant (and arguably successful) maneuvers was the fusion (not entry) of the Trotskyists in the U.S. with the American Workers' Party led by Muste. Some said, "But the program of XYZ grouping is closer to ours than that of the AWP and is not program key?" The reply was along the lines of: "Program is key, yes, but in building an organization we evaluate the groupings based on their history and trajectory. The AWP represents a movement. Centrist, yes, but healthy and growing. These other groups (like Gitlow) are ossified bureaucracies, not a movement."
And I also think of the break with the centrists in the Third International, people like Kautsky and Hugo Haase.

These various centrist groupings have words and programs that sounds far, far closer to the LRP's call for socialism than anything King every said and I would never, never quote them and say, "Sounds like us."
I can see where you are coming from and it's important when in these situations to evaluate things. But first of all I think your examples and this are apples and oranges because we are not talking about the politics of socialist groups and deciding what parts of a socialist movement (including the reformist elements) to ally with. In this case we are talking about how to relate to a non-radical, non-socialist movement.

If this were the mid and even late 60s, I don't think any radical group should uncritically support MLK or that side of the movement - I don't think everyone needs to be strongly denounced if they are merely a "sincere but misguided liberal/reformist" but they do need to have these political weaknesses strongly exposed (and all the articles and books I have ever read and seen by ISO members and allies do not uncritically talk about MLK - including all the ones linked to here) and then counterposed with the next more radical step forward as seen by radicals. If this were a living movement we would need to be making clear demands about where the movement should go and why it needs to go there to ultimately win - and we would probably need to figure out how to be organizing the left wing of the movement that could take on the liberals.

But if we are looking at a figure like King in our own present context, where this movement is long-gone and we have had 30 years of a retreat and backlash, I think it's a little different thing. We still need to be critical of the failings of liberal politics, clear on the violence of the oppressed vs. the oppressor, and so on.

But right now, the battle over what King represents is not primarily a battle over the liberal and militant wings of a living civil rights movement, but a battle between the view of King as an activist and critic of the US or as an idealist "dreamer" appealing to the US rulers. IMO he was a little of both and he wobbled because - as I contend - he was a sincere reformer who was butting up against the limitations of his own liberal outlook. More importantly for radicals, he was at a time and place where when he confronted the limits of liberalism actually did move more to the left. So this battle of the King legacy is the one the SW article takes on and why I say that MLK has been "whitewashed" with the more complicated and radical things about his story totally ignored in order for the US ruling class to isolate the entire civil rights more left-leaning conclusions. MLK is seen as the central figure of the civil rights movement and so it has implications for how people see change being accomplished if they see MLK as someone who merely asked for change nicely with some symbolic marches or if they see his legacy as one of a reformer who had to actually take to the streets and ended up being betrayed by liberals for his sincerity in regards to wanting an end to oppression. MLK has been sainted by the ruling class in order to control his legacy and so I think it is a good thing to expose that he actually was someone who was drawing increasingly class-conscious and social-democratic conclusions to the questions of race and racism and inequality in US society.

RFK is the other kind of liberal - the establishment one who appeals to movement only in order to co-opt them and take them in a ruling-class friendly avenue... like voting for Democrats and trying to lobby for change from the inside and all the things that 99.9% of the liberal activists today advocate. Fuck him, we should only dennounce people like that - MLK is more complicated IMO though and so I think it takes a more nuanced look at his legacy and his weaknesses when we are talking to non-socialists in various anti-racist or civil rights movements that we might be involved in.


Poverty, racism, militarism. While one cannot have capitalism without those things, that does not mean being against them means you are for overthrowing the capitalist system--a struggle against them can be confined to reforms, "revolutionary spirit" not withstanding.I totally agree.


It is not an accident, I don't think, that King in that final year based himself organizationally on the preachers still, whereas there's evidence that Malcolm's political organization he was building was mostly working-class--and that four years earlier when it would have been more difficult.Well yeah, I don't think MLK was really class-conscious and if he or Malcolm had survived to see the downswing of the movement I think eventually both of their trajectories would have been disappointing as were most of the figures from the New Left and Black Power movement: others who were not killed off became demoralized drop-outs or Democrats. But before they died both King and MLK were moving to the left and drawing conclusions that the system was the hub of what they had been fighting against. That being said, as much as I personally love Malcolm and wish he had become a socialist or whatnot, he still had many failings and if his new organization was primarily working class I don't think that was a conscious choice on the part of their organization, just a result of the class-perspective that Malcolm's kind of politics were appealing to. Even the NOI who had an almost explicitly petty-bourgeois point of view had a rank and file that was probably primarily working class people.

His trajectory IMO really was towards the Black Panthers (who explicitly said they were trying to pick up where X left off). MLK was a liberal moving towards social-democratic conclusions IMO. And so both of these figures are very helpful in talking about the politics of the civil rights movement and both should be free from having the ruling class putting their grubby history-revising hands off of!

In the ISO we usually point to the DRUM movement as the alternative way that the black power movement could have gone that would have altered the dynamics of the movement and helped it progress further than the high-water mark it actually achieved. But that doesn't mean that I think the Panthers or Malcolm (both of which should be criticized politically, without overlooking their positive contributions) should have their legacies defined by the ruling class. I think the same goes for King, he fought against oppression - and there were problems with his politics and approach - but right now, people actually following in his footsteps would represent progress for the class movement.


When King met the Memphis strikers, he was very demoralized and their energy led him to get carried away and advocate a general strike in Memphis. But it snowed that day and shut the city down--so God called the general strike I guess. But the real point that I've seen no one make is: King didn't organize it for another day--or for that matter, in other cities. The speech that night is one of the most amazing speeches I've ever seen in my life, perhaps the most actually. They sure don't make liberals like they used to.Sure and I guess that's my point. He wasn't a radical but at least he was committed to trying to change things and took the streets and even eventually faced rejection by many of his collaborators and allies in order to try and figure out how to take the movement beyond the impasses he began to face because of the limits of liberal politics. This was an incomplete process and he was far from a radical and for some steps forward, without a class analysis, he also took steps back, got disoriented and so on. The same things happened with Malcolm - he drew radical conclusions inside the NOI and would self-censor... in the last year before his assassination he would sometimes sound like a Guevarist and other-times sound like a cultural lifestylist.

But is King "merely" a liberal or a liberal being radicalized in 1968? In one sense, the question cannot be answered 100% posed as such.


But I will repeat an earlier question about the Poor People's March: King was frustrated with the inability and unresponsiveness of preachers to mobilize the "poor" for this march. If he was radicalizing, why did he not call on groups like SNCC, CORE and the myriad local, "grassroots" Black groups developing across the country to organize for the march? I mean, he was frustrated with his base of organizers--and there's whole other layers of organizers he knows...and he doesn't do it. I think the answer comes down to class. He was a reformist and the system at that point needed "radical" reformists. He played that role well and could not have played it by using those other groups to organize the march.I think you are right about class and why MLK was limited, but again I don't think that the ruling class of the 1960s would find someone speaking to the radicalizing conclusions people were making that connected Vietnam, Racism, and Poverty together all that particularly useful - especially when that figure was sometimes not cowing to the conservatives in his own organization or the the liberals who were promising him access and opportunities if he'd play nice.


On the nonviolence thing, I must not have been clear because I'm not saying the ISO favors nonviolence in principle but that the article at best leaves the door open to favoring it strategically. What do you think Jones means by saying "Setting aside the question of nonviolence as a principle, King’s words foretell the strategic cul-de-sac in which many radicals found themselves after his death." The words in question are from a debate with Robert Williams, who successfully organized armed self-defense to defend Black people from the Klan, and Jones says King's "words" against that "foretell the strategic cul-de-sac".I'll have to re-read the article for to answer this, but I just give it a general stab for now:


There are incalculable perils in this approach. It is not the danger or sacrifice of physical being which is primary, though it cannot be contemplated without a sense of deep concern for human life. The greatest danger is that it will fail to attract Negroes to a real collective struggle, and will confuse the large uncommitted middle group, which as yet has not supported either side.

Wouldn't "leaving aside the question of non-violence" mean that Jones is saying that aside from this question of arming yourself (which I side with Malcolm X on this and I'm sure Brian Jones also agrees with that) the issue of widening the struggle... which was a problem for the movement and led to many then turning to the Democrats or turning inwards and looking for counter-cultural versions of Black Power through cultural things. Again, I can't remember the context of Jone's argument in this section, but it seems like he is ignoring the question of violence in that quote in order talk about something else about that quote.

[gorillafuck]

It is also said that Castro may have had a small part in his death.
That's ridiculous. Where has that been said?

[Ocean Seal]

That's ridiculous. Where has that been said?
Its a capitalist fairy tale. That is essentially predicated on the idea that Castro was jealous of Che's fame and then he somehow commanded the US backed Bolivian forces to execute Che. Its funny how capitalists write their tales, I mean come on is this even believable to reactionaries.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Yes this has been true for a while. They have done this a lot. Not only to Zapata, but to the Spanish Revolution (notice how they never teach about Anarchist Catalonia), to the radical abolitionist movement, to Jesus, and to Debs. Its almost sickening that they will declare some revolts monstrous and praise others while perverting their intentions.I was trying to think of US examples, but it's hard to think of actual revolutionaries that the US tried to appropriate so that's why I think MLK is the best example, even though he wasn't a radical. I don't know if Debs has been sanitized, but I'd be interested if anyone knows examples of this - I don't doubt that they would, I'm just not familiar with any examples. John Brown is an example I think considering that he was killed by the state and then turned into a martyr by the same governmnet towards the end of the Civil War. But then the ruling class has also re-demonized him after radical reconstruction.

[GPDP]

I was trying to think of US examples, but it's hard to think of actual revolutionaries that the US tried to appropriate so that's why I think MLK is the best example, even though he wasn't a radical. I don't know if Debs has been sanitized, but I'd be interested if anyone knows examples of this - I don't doubt that they would, I'm just not familiar with any examples. John Brown is an example I think considering that he was killed by the state and then turned into a martyr by the same governmnet towards the end of the Civil War. But then the ruling class has also re-demonized him after radical reconstruction.

Debs was referred to rather positively by Keith Olbermann some time ago. Dunno if that counts.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Debs was referred to rather positively by Keith Olbermann some time ago. Dunno if that counts.Holy shit really!:laugh:

Oh yeah, I guess when it comes to his famous anti-war speech, liberals sometimes do bring him up in a favorable light on that one issue while also treating the rest of his politics as some kind of antiquated curiosity like being a flapper or gold-prospector or something.

[RedTrackWorker]

Wouldn't "leaving aside the question of non-violence" mean that Jones is saying that aside from this question of arming yourself (which I side with Malcolm X on this and I'm sure Brian Jones also agrees with that) the issue of widening the struggle... which was a problem for the movement and led to many then turning to the Democrats or turning inwards and looking for counter-cultural versions of Black Power through cultural things. Again, I can't remember the context of Jone's argument in this section, but it seems like he is ignoring the question of violence in that quote in order talk about something else about that quote.


http://www.isreview.org/issues/58/feat-MLK.shtml

Nonviolence, King believed, was not just morally superior as a means of change, but strategically superior. In a debate with the self-defense advocate Robert Williams, King wrote, regarding the advocacy of violence as a tool of advancement:

There are incalculable perils in this approach. It is not the danger or sacrifice of physical being which is primary, though it cannot be contemplated without a sense of deep concern for human life. The greatest danger is that it will fail to attract Negroes to a real collective struggle, and will confuse the large uncommitted middle group, which as yet has not supported either side.
Setting aside the question of nonviolence as a principle, King’s words foretell the strategic cul-de-sac in which many radicals found themselves after his death.

Jones refers to the distinction between a moral and strategic conception of nonviolence, then says "let's leave it aside as a principle [i.e. moral]" and implies to me, look at the strategic considerations.
I don't think you can take the King quote apart like that, because in context (I've read the debate), King is saying that it is guns that will "fail to attract...a real collective struggle" and "confuse the...middle group." In reality, Williams and the Deacons had a far more collective, self-organized, working-class base than the organizations and marches King built--many, especially older Black men, would refuse to join a march on the condition that they not defend themselves. King is right that it would polarize away some of the "middle" group, but the Deacons and Williams both proved this in practice that this did not mean blocking the struggle's advancement but that rather, tying the struggle to the hesitations of middle groupings was what blocked advancement. So I cannot figure out what Jones could mean here.

Back to the other point, I'll sum up my difference like this:
The Black Panthers and Malcolm's group could've been a base for the revolutionary vanguard party through a process of splits and fusions. For MLK to have played a positive role in that process would've required him breaking completely with his organization and repudiating his past--something I don't think was possible, but even if you think it was possible, do you not see a qualitative difference between MLK on the one hand and Malcolm and the Panthers on the other?

[Jimmie Higgins]

Jones refers to the distinction between a moral and strategic conception of nonviolence, then says "let's leave it aside as a principle [i.e. moral]" and implies to me, look at the strategic considerations.

I don't think you can take the King quote apart like that, because in context (I've read the debate), King is saying that it is guns that will "fail to attract...a real collective struggle" and "confuse the...middle group."Ok fair enough on the debate that this quote is taken from, but now that I've gone back and re-read this article, I think it's clear that Jones is NOT talking about that particular debate, but about:


They were also based on serious strategic considerations. Since Blacks were a minority of society, King believed they had to build a coalition with other groups. Thus, when it became clear that the northern liberal establishment would not support him in opposing the war in Vietnam, or in fighting for economic equality, King looked to build a new coalition with working-class whites and other oppressed groups. So "leaving aside the question of nonviolence on principle" Jones is discussing that quote in the context of the above quoted text which is in the paragraph right before the quote. He is not contrasting the two views in the debate where the quote comes from he is contrasting the view that MLK's non-violence was solely a moral principle as liberals often present it when they tell us to "emulate MLK" but that it was based on strategic considerations about how to grow the movement - so again I think this is an example of where MLK was maybe incorrect, but coming from a sincere reformer position, not a just a liberal trying to prevent violence for the sake of controlling the movement to help out the establishment.

Both Malcolm X and the Panthers also ran up against this question - Malcolm sought a cross-class alliance to "unify the black community" while the Pathers, learning from some of the limitations of black nationalism that developed after Malcolm's death, went a set forward and looked to ally with non-black radical figures and forces. So obviously, "non-violence" is not the only or best way to accomplish this.


In reality, Williams and the Deacons had a far more collective, self-organized, working-class base than the organizations and marches King built--many, especially older Black men, would refuse to join a march on the condition that they not defend themselves. King is right that it would polarize away some of the "middle" group, but the Deacons and Williams both proved this in practice that this did not mean blocking the struggle's advancement but that rather, tying the struggle to the hesitations of middle groupings was what blocked advancement. So I cannot figure out what Jones could mean here.Again, I think it's fairly clear when read in the context of the argument he was making in this case and again, the next paragraph mentions the BPP so he was explicitly not talking about the issue of non-violence in the quote, but that MLK was grappling with the question of how to broaden the movement.


Back to the other point, I'll sum up my difference like this:
The Black Panthers and Malcolm's group could've been a base for the revolutionary vanguard party through a process of splits and fusions. For MLK to have played a positive role in that process would've required him breaking completely with his organization and repudiating his past--something I don't think was possible, but even if you think it was possible, do you not see a qualitative difference between MLK on the one hand and Malcolm and the Panthers on the other?Between the Panthers yes, with Malcolm, less-so because he had failings too, but they were in different areas than MLK's since Malcolm was really a radical - just not one with a solid class-based view. I also think we are maybe at cross-purposes here with some of this debate around this figure - the only thing I really disagree with in this debate is the idea that MLK only moved to the left in order to co-op the movement. I am not trying to look at MLK as a revolutionary figure - I don't think we can really look back in history and criticize non-socialists for not being socialist enough (while certainty also arguing that really it would have taken socialist revolutionary ideas to push the struggle forward past the impasses the MLK and the movement in general ran into) ... does that make sense? He needs to be seen within the context of his liberalism - yes, this means his politics had failings, but we can still look and see how his political trajectory was generally heading in a more challenging direction. I don't disagree with your criticisms of MLK, but it seems to me that you are criticizing him for failing to push forward a real working class socialist agenda like we might criticize social-democrats or something who say they are fighting for socialism but are really leading the movement towards collaboration with the ruling class. These issues need to be raised (and people did raise them - particularly radicals and militants like Malcolm X), but I don't think we should expect a non-revolutionary to have revolutionary-consciousness and not being a revolutionary doesn't necessarily make a figure like this someone who was trying to co-opt the movement like RFK or other establishment figures tried to lure-in anti-war and civil rights activists. We need to see MLK in the context of where he was coming from as someone with illusions in liberalism and the US government - illusions that were challenged both by people like Malcolm, but the dynamics of the civil rights movement itself.

Why is this important? To me it's important for radicals and anti-racist activists to actually present this critical view of MLK because for millions of people in this country, he is synonymous with the civil rights movement. It matters if his legacy is controlled by the ruling class because if liberals convince people he was all about non-violence and asking politely for rights, it impacts how people are going to think about how to successfully make change. If the right convinces the population that MLK was all about "color-blindness" and merely "treating people the same" it also has an impact about how people see the legacy of civil rights. That's why I think it's important that radicals, while being up front about the limitations of liberalism, do tell the "take it to the streets" side of MLK and why he did end up moving to the left because in practice he was hitting the roadblocks of reformism.

[RedTrackWorker]

Jimmie Higgins, I'm convinced our different takes on MLK are based on deep-going political principles, but I'm also convinced that I don't see how to get at those principles through this debate. Perhaps I just can't do it or maybe it's because we're basically asking, "Where would King have gone if he had lived?"
You say he was moving left because "in practice he was hitting the roadblocks of reformism." I (and Graymouser) argue he was moving left in order to defend reformism better.
I think the ISO articles on MLK are far too conciliatory toward him and you think I'm missing the point.
Does that seem like a fair summary? If so, I'm comfortable leaving those different conclusions out there in the confidence that the people I would want to talk who are informed on the issue will side with me. That being said, I look forward to debating you again.