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KING WAS WRIGHT |
| | King’s scathing criticisms of American foreign policy went far deeper than Wright’s superficial attacks. King described his disdain for the very nature of our foreign policy especially that which emerged after WWII. His meticulous navigation through the ugliest aspects of American foreign policy was rooted in his desire to drastically change the way we interact with the world. He hoped that one day we would, “With righteous indignation . . . look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the west investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say, ‘This is not just”. |
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< | But the speech does not just contain Obamaesque hope. It warns in no uncertain terms that if these changes are not made America will end up on the wrong side of a world revolution. It accuses America of making peaceful revolution impossible because we refuse to “give up the privileges and pleasures that come from immense profits of overseas investments.” Although King falls short of explicitly saying that there will be violence here as a result of our activities abroad, it is naturally inferable and likely what he believed. |
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> | But the speech does not just contain Obamaesque hope. It warns in no uncertain terms that if these changes are not made America will end up on the wrong side of a world revolution. It accuses America of making peaceful revolution impossible because we refuse to “give up the privileges and pleasures that come from immense profits of overseas investments.” |
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- I don't know why you need the final sentence. It requires you to speculate, which opens an unnecessary hole. Your argument is complete without it. I would remove it.
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| | Wright’s speech goes where King was unwilling or unable to go. In his faith footnote at the three minute mark, Wright engages his congregation in a description of many of the worst acts by the United States government. He begins by describing the atrocities of history and navigates through time to events that recently occurred. After chronicling the examples of violence and terrorism that the United States government has either committed or supported, he concludes, “America’s chickens are coming home to roost. Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred. And terrorism begets terrorism.”
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< | Although Wright’s rhetorical devices are far different from King’s both in diction and delivery, the essence of his speech are in lock step with King, namely, that a foreign policy based on exploitation and violence has consequences. King did not live to see decades of violent reactions to American foreign policy since Vietnam, but Wright’s comments are in some ways a reflection that King’s warnings have been manifest. Were he here, though he might not agree with Wright’s rhetoric, he would likely acquiesce to its logic. |
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> | Although Wright’s rhetorical devices are far different from King’s both in diction and delivery, the essence of his speech is in lock step with King, namely, that a foreign policy based on exploitation and violence has consequences. King did not live to see decades of violent reactions to American foreign policy since Vietnam, but Wright’s comments are in some ways a reflection that King’s warnings have been manifest. Were he here, though he might not agree with Wright’s rhetoric, he would likely acquiesce to its logic. |
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- You shouldn't ever let grammatical mistakes like that get by your proofreading. People do draw unconscious but destructive inferences from simple grammar errors made in haste, even when made by highly-educated people.
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| | CONCLUSION |
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< | During King’s final years his platform expanded beyond race, encompassing poverty and American foreign policy realizing the relationship between each issue. |
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> | King’s final years saw his platform expand beyond race, drawing connections between race, poverty and American foreign policy. |
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- This sentence ends awkwardly, which the first sentence of your conclusion must never do. The conclusion is the most rhetorically powerful part of any written work, and it should intensify resonance and flow, never suppress them.
Four decades later, Wright, like King, went beyond the acceptable box of racial discussion and instead attacked American foreign policy. As the media played isolated clips on loop and as those clips proliferated on youtube, America’s ire with the preacher grew and he was dismissed outright as a black anti American. When Obama realized he needed to address his pastor’s words he confined the discussion to race. |
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< | He likely understood that to confront the foreign policy aspects of the remarks would have been at least political suicide, but we are not faced with those same constraints. We are free to remember the warnings of four decades ago, examine our foreign policy since, and perhaps come to the same conclusion that Wright made - - that our actions abroad have consequences at home. America was not ready to heed Dr. King’s warning four decades ago, and we may not be ready to accept admonishment from a Chicago pastor now, but eventually we might all be drawn to the same conclusion. |
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> | He likely understood that to confront the foreign policy aspects of the remarks would have been at least political suicide, but we are not faced with those same constraints. We are free to remember the warnings of four decades ago, examine our foreign policy since, and perhaps come to the same conclusion that Wright made - - that our actions abroad have consequences at home. Americans were not ready to heed Dr. King’s warning four decades ago, and we may not be ready to accept admonishment from a Chicago pastor now, but eventually we might all be drawn to the same conclusion. |
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- Another valuable lesson might be that there is no entity called "America," which either does or does not hear, but people. Americans on the left not only heard King on civil rights, but on the war and poverty as well. My mother had many reasons for waking me in tears that April night to tell me King had died: She was weeping for many murdered dreams. The divide separating those who are angry at Jeremiah Wright from those who heard truth to be angry about rather than at is not the divide between American and non-American. It's the divide between left and right. We never said "Americans" had to be leftists; here, only the right uses "patriotism" as an instrument to suppress opposing views.
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