There are 3 major ‘Kings’ in Memphis- you’ve got Elvis- The King, B.B. King the blues guitarist and singer (see Blues and BBQ blog entrée), and finally, the last King is Dr. Martin Luther King (MLK). In no way should they be compared to one another.
Our next stop was the Civil Rights Museum which includes the Lorraine Hotel where Martin Luther King was assassinated outside of room 306. The museum is excellent and very moving.
In this age we live in, more and more people have very limited education and/or memories. They don’t remember that not long ago, workers had no rights, pay was bad, and many jobs were unsafe. It took life and death struggles to bring about change with worker’s Unions. They don’t remember separate but equal was just a racist lie and was dismantled by civil rights actions and the courts. They don’t remember that statues, the KKK, and Jim Crow laws were built to keep the vestiges of slavery intact in spite of our constitution. They don’t remember lynchings, church bombings, buses being torched, and men, women, boys and girls being killed. It is very sad.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” cite: George Santayana. It is sad that we all have friends and acquaintances that are so in love with such blissful ignorances.
The Civil Rights Museum in Memphis should be mandatory for all people of all races. Every student should go thru a class in elementary school that covers the “Trail of Tears” (native Americans evicted from their own land), the birth of workers’ Unions, the fight for women’s equal rights, the civil disobedience actions of America’s Black populations for equal rights, and the battles that exist today to disempower and disenfranchise citizens through our bought political parties, big corporations, wealthy “barons”, voter suppression, et al.
As we read the headlines of today, we, as a society have come far, but there is still so much work that needs to be done…
