January 21, 2008
A Posting For Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day
I can make no claims for how any individual or group ought to continue to remember the gains of liberty that were made in the 1960s. I can offer my opinions as to what ought to be done in the future to continue the advancement of liberty.
Many people make the claim that people of certain racial groups are trapped in bad situations, and can only get out via government bailouts, the money being taken other racial groups. I say that is an unfair and racist practice.
Many people make the claim that people of certain ethnicities are trapped in bad situations where they cannot perform as well as other ethnicities, and therefore ought to be admitted into colleges or given jobs with less qualifications than those of other groups. I say that is an unfair and racist practice.
Many people make the claim that people with certain skin tones are trapped in bad situations where they are forced into a life of crime, so we ought not to blame them for their acts of violence and greed. I say that is an unfair and racist practice.
Why are these unfair and racist practices? They are based on ideas just as condescending and degrading and enslaving as the ideas of segregation and of slavery. The claims above are based on the idea that people of certain ideas are helpless victims, totally unable to change their situation. The idea is that these supposedly oppressed victims need someone else to give them things and compensate for them, because they simply can't measure up to the standards that everyone else can meet. Everyone else is reprehensible for causing the problems of these victims, and so any criticism of the ideas are simply the self-satisfying rationalizations of bigots.
These ideas, I realize, are being held by people who think they are doing the right thing. Having acknowledged the sincerity of the beliefs, we must question whether they are right. Some slave owners sincerely thought that they were doing a good thing by civilizing and helping their slaves. Was it right for them to have owned slaves, however sincere their desire to educate them?
I say that anyone of any ethnicity, in any situation, can make choices. They can make choices to make their life and the lives of people around them better or worse. I believe people are responsible for those choices.
I say that it is talent and application, not ethnicity, that determines whether a person able to meet high standards, and that it is unfair, racist, and degrading to make the standards lax for one or several ethnicities, assuming that they can't measure up.
When people of every ethnicity are given true liberty and take responsibility for their choices, they do amazing things. They have in the past, and I believe they will continue to do so in the future.
I'd like to take a moment to gratefully remember the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and the travails of many people who worked for greater human liberty in the 1960s. It was difficult, and the way was often marked by pain and death. We are so fortunate that there was as little as there was. Most of the reason for that is the leadership of Dr. King and others, who wisely counseled patience and peace, instead of impatiently unleashing further violence. Their forbearance and patient, but forceful, denunciation of the evil around them, led to a great change that has materially advanced the liberty of millions in this nation and around the world. I gratefully remember the sacrifices of the civil rights movement.