• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
Women's Legacy Project
  • Home
  • About
  • How To Curate
  • Our Collective Legacy
  • Writing Online Memoir
  • Blog
Women's Legacy Project > Blog > Uncategorized > MLK Day Turns 30

MLK Day Turns 30

Written by: womenslegacy
Published: January 17, 2016 -- Last Modified: January 17, 2016
2 Comments

It has been 30 years since the first official national recognition of Martin Luther King’s birthday as a National Holiday in 1986.
Photo of Martin Luther King leaning on lectern in 1964. Originally from http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print sharpened for wiki use.
Much changes in thirty years.  Undoubtedly articles across the web today will mention how Arizona, the place I live, did not initially observe the Martin Luther King Federal Holiday when it was first designated as a Federal Holiday. Few will mention that universities in Arizona, such as the University of Arizona that is just down the street from me, now close for the day.  Things change.
This is wonderful.  No ifs, and or buts apply.
But Presidents’ Day is not observed here.  So I think that culturally, Arizona, has learned to cooperate, but it has also learned how to maintain the status quo.
Arizona, as a state, as a political entity, represents the surface level, though probably not conscious action, of cultural incorporation of the most threatening element to the state’s existence.
This is how large scale culture works.  Only the most threatening emergent processes are swallowed up by established processes.   Incorporated or integrated processes are subsumed into mass culture.
Rome knew this.  Its military did not destroy the lands and peoples it conquered.  They incorporated them into the empire.
I firmly believe that the MLK Day controversy was a much deeper and more profound cultural controversy than it appeared when it was happening.  It was not just about honoring a black minister who was the leader of a civil rights movement, although that facet of Martin Luther King’s life was more than worthy of such recognition.  It was about all the changes that would be necessary to create a country in which character, a person’s enacted essence, matters more than any physical trait, level of education, or the amount of money had by the family of origin. The powers that were, and still are, did not want King’s egalitarian honor to be central to our nation.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

These “powers that be” may not even realize that they are engaged in the attempt to render ineffective that thing, concept, or process that they outwardly laud.  We are all part of a hugely complex cultural system comprised of 8 million individuals with effectively infinite connections between those people and cultural norms derived from the efficacy of millennia of civic development that draws upon humanity through time and not just space.  No one of us understands how culture works. We can identify pattens and talk about statistical likelihoods.  We are a part of the system and cannot be apart from or outside the system.  All our understanding is subjective and limited by our biological nature as part of the physical universe.
This lofty, and probably overly intellectual presentation, of the perspective that “things are not as they seem” boils down to a core sentiment, ancient sentiment expressed by Sun-Tzu that “we should hold our friends close, but our enemies closer.”
Women, minorities, and oppressed groups where I live have the same number of days off through Federal Holidays, if their workplaces observes MLK Day, which way more than 50% do not observe, according to a BNA report, than before this holiday was recognized.  The number is the same because a previously state observed holiday, Presidents Day, was no longer sanctioned as a day off.  The new holiday simply replaced the old one after the outcry about Arizona’s purportedly racist decision to not give state-employed workers an additional holiday with the Federal recognition of Martin Luther King’s birthday as a Federal Holiday.  State and corporate employers juggled the system to their economic advantage, or at least not to their loss.
I’m not denying that racist individuals exist in Arizona.  They do. But oligarchic concerns came out on top in the MLK-cluster-bleep that defined Arizona and economic loss beyond boycotts and football games.
We have much work to do to as women cultural leaders to bring that dream of a character-based culture into existence.  National holidays should be honored because of the importance of the ideas behind them, not because of economic consideration. Honor and character need to be given more weight in our society.
 
 

Categories: UncategorizedTags: Arizona, history, honor, Martin Luther King, MLK, observance

Support Independent Bookstores - Visit IndieBound.org
Previous Post: « Tucson, Five Years On
Next Post: The Nature of the Thing »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Sandy mauck

    January 18, 2016 at 10:42 am

    Let’s begin with no longer using the nomenclature of “African-American”, or “Asian-American” or any other hypenated American term. WE are ALL Americans. We are ALL responsible for how this country is.

    Reply
    • Nancy Hill

      January 21, 2016 at 3:05 pm

      I can give a hearty “amen” to that. It is hard to rewire speech, but it can be done.

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CommentLuv badgeShow more posts

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Footer

Recent Posts

  • Ending, and Beginning
  • For Our Daughters
  • Stand and Write
  • Context and Little Things
  • A Month is Just a Month… as Time Goes By
  • Processing Two Very Different Deaths
  • A Dehydrated and Delusional Friend Found Wandering in 100° Heat
  • About Women’s Legacy & Hill Research
  • Privacy Policy and Terms of Use

Archives

Powered by
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
View my Flipboard Magazine.

© 2023, Nancy Hill, Women's Legacy Project of Hill Research Services, LLC

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Reject Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT