It’s that time of year. Get ready for the whitewashing and sanitary retellings of who MLK was and what his holiday should mean. Instead of spending another year starting and stopping at “I Have a Dream,” let’s approach this civil rights icon and his legacy with some common sense for our people.
Martin Luther King Jr. worked closely with President Lyndon B. Johnson, a man who came from a deeply segregated South and held biases many of us would rightly call unacceptable today. These men were fundamentally different and guided by different moral compasses. But, they were grown men who conducted the business of the people that needed to be conducted.
King didn’t have the luxury of waiting for someone who shared his values or worldview. He had to move with urgency because his people couldn’t afford to wait. And guess what? Neither can our young people.
Let’s break this down. President Johnson, a man from the South, was raised in a system of segregation and absolutely carried the prejudices of his environment. If you’ve only been told he was purely a champion of civil rights and some presidential messiah for Black people, you’ve, of course, been lied to. His biographer, Robert Caro, wrote about how he would call his own civil rights bill “the nigger bill,” a word he was fond of when engaging white segregationists and during his decades in Congress fighting against civil rights.
But King wasn’t concerned about Johnson’s feelings about him or his people. What mattered was whether Johnson would move the needle on the long-denied civil rights for Black people in this country. For that, King was willing to have hard conversations, uncomfortable meetings, and even compromise with those who didn’t see his full humanity.
I know it’s easy to look at today’s power structure and say, ‘I’m not working with that person. I don’t like their politics. I don’t trust them. They’re part of the problem.’ I get it. But let me ask: Who’s suffering while you sit it out? Because disengagement might feel righteous, but for the majority of our students—students who look like us and communities who depend on us—disengagement is the biggest form of privilege. They can’t afford for us to wait until we feel comfortable.
MLK didn’t have the privilege of waiting for an ally who treated him with dignity or shared his values. Instead, he walked into rooms where he wasn’t wanted and made demands that couldn’t be ignored.
And let me be clear: King wasn’t naive. He knew Johnson wasn’t his friend. But he also knew Johnson was the man in power, and power moves systems, not feelings.
Let me give you another example. You’ve probably heard about the Mafia, but you might not have heard about “The Five Families in Organized Crime.” These were different factions of Italian-American mob families that were often mortal enemies, but when it came to business, they sat in the same rooms, negotiated business, and made agreements—nefarious as they were. Why? Because they understood the stakes (in this case, a lot of money and power) and what was at risk by refusing to engage each other. Now, if these lifelong enemies could come together for their own financial interests, how much more should we be able to do to fight for the future of our children?
We don’t have to like the people who are in power. The reality is that even if we do, we won’t agree with them on everything.
We should be working to put people into power who truly align with us and our interests. But what we have to do now is constantly fight for our children and our communities.
Fight for their right to a quality education.
Fight for resources in their schools, which are too often denied.
Fight for them to know the truth about who they are and where they come from.
And fight for their ability to gain the skills they need to thrive as they enter society.
Sitting it out might make you feel good at the moment, but it doesn’t do a damn thing for the child who’s waiting for a good teacher, a counselor, or a safe school to embrace them and help them grow.
Here’s our common sense reality: we don’t have the luxury of inaction. Of waiting for the perfect “ally” to save us. King understood that. He didn’t just preach to the choir; he walked into the lion’s den. And because he did, laws changed. Lives changed. We’re talking about voting rights for our people, ending legal discrimination, and effectively ending the evil of Jim Crow, amongst other things. So yeah, we might have to sit at the table with people we can’t stand, and who can’t stand us. But if it’s for our kids, their education, and their futures, then it’s worth it. Every. Single. Time.
The stakes are too high, and the clock is ticking. This isn’t about comfort—it’s about responsibility. Let’s get to it.