Here for MLK Day 2016 is my new piece for Diplomatic Courier, looking at a less well-known speech by Martin Luther King back in 1957

He deftly juxtaposes extreme optimism with extreme pessimism:

The extreme optimist and the extreme pessimist have at least one thing in common: they both agree that we must sit down and do nothing. The extreme optimist says do nothing because integration is inevitable. The extreme pessimist says do nothing because integration is impossible.

He opts for what he calls realism:

We have come a long way, but we have a long long way to go.

He rehearses the history of slavery, and describes how step by painful step things have changed. He wins applause with his light touch:

We have been able to see old man segregation on his deathbed. And I’m sure most of us would be very happy to see the old brother pass on, because he’s been a disturbing factor to the whole community.

He runs with that grimly witty metaphor to explain why lots more hard work is needed:

Social systems have a great last-minute breathing power, and the guardians of the status quo are always on hand with their oxygen tents to keep the old order alive …

What’s striking about this speech and the wider approach and style of Martin Luther King was how generous it was. He demanded a just outcome, but he also saw that the best outcomes are built on mutual respect and a just process:

Let us be sure that our methods are thoroughly moral and Christian … I know it’s really hard when we think of the tragic midnight of injustice and oppression that we’ve had to live under so many years, but let us not become bitter.

Let us never indulge in hate campaigns, for we can’t solve the problem like that … the end my friends is reconciliation, the end is redemption.

This speech won storming applause. It reads so well now because its clear core arguments are advanced with uncompromisingly bold baroque language and imagery.

But above all its sheer generosity of spirit shines through. Dr. King does not call for revenge or ‘safe spaces’. He does not sneer at the civilizational achievements of white people. He insists on emphasising the positive, to develop together what all decent people have in common. How lame and old-fashioned that sounds for today’s aggressive ‘social justice’.

Indeed. A few decades later, that MLK generosity has been swept aside. Sell-out! We ‘white’ (ie slightly pink) folk are told to grovel before our new ideological superiors. Or else.