Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

[Rebecca Kalamata]

Below is the text of the speech that the mayor of Redondo Beach, Bill Brand, gave the other night at Redondo Beach's first MLK Day celebration. He said that it took him four hours to actually write the speech, but a lifetime of learning and studying about MLK to be inspired to craft it.

Bill was at the same high school as me in the early 1970s. The area in which we lived and went to school was privileged and all white. It refreshes me to learn that I was not the only one at that school who was applying themselves to black history and figuring out what had and what was going on. I remember rushing to introduce myself to the only black girl to enter our high school. Then I realized that this in itself was a form of prejudice. This was the year after MLK was killed. It was two years into my Group years, it was the hippie years, the Vietnam War years, the OMG Nixon years, the women's lib years. Up until that point I had wanted to "help poor inner-city black kids" when I grew up. Being confronted with the difficulty and depth of my own racial prejudice, I let my dream go and stumbled on.

Years later when I was about to graduate with a BA in Clinical-Community Psychology, I learned that Los Angeles Unified School District was hiring just about anybody with a BA to teach school, due to a shortage of teachers, due to all the immigrants, legal and illegal, and primarily Mexican, Guatemalan, El Salvadoran and Nicaraguan that were inundating the school system. These hirelings would receive on the job training and full beginning teacher salary provided they complete 2 years of course work to earn their California State Teacher Credential. By then I had figured out that #1, I was far better at talking than listening, and #2, that I really didn't like being around depressed people. So much for becoming a therapist. So much for why I became an inner-city school teacher.

Of import to me now is that I accidentally found myself doing that which I had originally intended to do and for a far more valid reason. I needed a well paying and fulfilling job. And there was nothing else on the horizon. (I never have figured out exactly what a degree in Clinical-Community Psychology had prepared me to do) One might exclaim, "But that's a selfish reason! Your original desire to 'help the poor black kids' was far more socially conscious and worthy." Yes but as Leo is fond of saying, it was very tricky. I like to call a spade a spade and not a digging implement. But there is a major theme here of manifestation. I have REALIZED ALL my core underlying themes. I only half facetiously say now that the only valid reason for therapy is to figure out what you are afraid of lest you manifest (continue to?) manifest it. 

To many of my readers (ha, well to you one or two of my readers) my journey perhaps seems like it has taken a long time with way too much strife and way too many side trips. It has. But SERIOUSLY what else is there to do? God willing and the levee don't break, it will take all of us a long time. But check out this perspective: I was born Blue, I teethed on and then fought through Orange, I saw the fallacy of Green, and Allah be praised, God bless me, and thank you oh Force. Maybe, maybe I am actually about to rocketship through Yellow cause yes Horatio, I will get my hands on all kinds of psychedelics.

How is this possible? I could fall on my knees and kiss the feet of every illegal immigrant that braved that river, crossed that desert, let themselves be packed into the backs of those trucks. Without them, I would not have the savings, the pension, or the health care plan that enables all of this manna from heaven to befall me. I would not be realizing my REAL dream, that of actually, really, living a bi-cultural/two world life. While I was teaching, days would go by without me seeing another caucasian face except in the cars traveling past me heading to or from work. My friends and colleagues were all either African American or Hispanic, as were all of my students. This was an honor for me. It was an honor to be accepted into their worlds, to be given the opportunity to abolish to the core, all traces of culturally implanted ethnic and racial prejudice. So once again, I fuck all taboos in the ass. One's adherence to taboos does not define one as being a 'good' person.

Anand and Michael discussed something in the video in Leo's blog that has been in my awareness since I saw Trump on the stage just after he learned of his election. It was just a moment in which he kind of gazed around and said to himself, "Huh, I'm the President". Boy did I get it that we were in some serious trouble. And the trouble is not Trump. The trouble is that 'you people' whoever you are, elected this buffoon over Hilary Clinton who for better or for worse is/was more qualified to do the fucking job than anyone who has ever lived in any democracy on this planet. OMG. And I immediately got it that Pandora's box had been opened. The problem is not Trump. The problem is that the next Devil, if our world consciousness does not beat him back, will NOT BE a buffoon.                           And it's gonna look like, "AND HE'S OH SO GOOD, AND HE'S OH SO KIND. AND HE'S OH SO HEALTHY IN HIS BODY AND HIS MIND".

As Neale Donald Walshe said, "Wake up, wake up, wake up". 

Follows is Bill Brand, mayor of Redondo Beach, California's, MLK Day speech

MLK Day 2020 - Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

Good evening everyone,

I’m so very honored to be here speaking as the Mayor of Redondo Beach on our first annual celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

I’ve been studying and reading again about the history of the atrocities committed against African-Americans that started when they were first kidnapped from their homeland and brought to America about 400 years ago. Since that time, America’s march toward true freedom and equality for all has been a tale of Two steps forward and One step back.

The Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776 declaring:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

Two steps forward…

While the Declaration of Independence was two huge steps forward, it was followed by a Constitution which included the Fugitive Slave Act, the 3/5 clause and allowed the international slave trade to continue for another 20 years.

One step back…
I guess equality was not that self-evident at the time.

I’ve learned one can trace the life of Frederick Douglas in the 19th Century to get a sense of the type of persistence it takes to get to justice. He was born a slave in Maryland in 1818. And after being orphaned, enslaved, beaten and rented-out, he escaped to New York City at the age of 20. From these humble beginnings, he became one of the greatest orators, writers, thinkers, and statesmen that America has ever known. I encourage everyone to read up on the life of Frederick Douglas.

While obviously a leader of the abolitionist movement, he was also an opponent of Abraham Lincoln in the early part of the Civil War because Lincoln had not yet made the war about, 'freeing the slaves'. But Frederick Douglas quickly became a huge supporter after the Emancipation Proclamation and Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

Two steps forward…

But then after the Union victory and the assassination of President Lincoln, Andrew Johnson took over as President and lectured Frederick Douglas that black people were responsible for the war, that they will never gain political rights like voting, and that they should colonize somewhere outside of the United States.

One step back...

Frederick Douglas carried on anyway though, and pushed for what became the Voting Rights Act and the 15th amendment of the Constitution, giving black men their right to vote.

Two steps forward…

I don’t have time to go through the whole history of America’s start/stopping on our way to true equality, but I do know we’re not there yet.

The 20th Century leader who encapsulates our true essence of freedom and equal representation for all and the persistence it takes to get there, that we are here to celebrate today, is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

He orchestrated several two steps forward in his 39 years with us and witnessed and suffered several one step back events. But through it all, he maintained his perseverance and his faith in our basic humanity and was never afraid to say it loud and say it proud.

Like Frederick Douglas of the 19th Century, Dr. King was our great orator, writer, thinker and statesman of the 20th Century.

Many don’t know that there was an assassination attempt on Dr. King in 1958. A lady stabbed him in the chest at a book signing in Harlem, and only emergency surgery saved him.

One step back…

10-years later, in 1968, his flight to Memphis was delayed due to a bomb threat. He made it in time anyway to give his “I’ve Been to the Mountain Top” speech, the day before he was assassinated. Let me read an excerpt from that speech:
“I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!”

Two steps forward…
The very next day he was assassinated by a white supremacist.

One step back…

20 years later, in 2008, we elected Barack Obama to be our first African American President. I’ll call that 3-steps forward. Can I get a hallelujah?

But here we are in 2020, with white supremacists Nazi sympathizers marching through the streets of Virginia inciting violence and carrying torches saying things like “Jews will not replace us.” And a US President reacting with statements like: "There were very fine people on both sides."

One step back…

There is no doubt in my mind that this recent empowerment of those who oppose equality and freedom for all in America will be met with two steps forward. I don’t know yet what those two steps forward will be, but there will be two steps forward.
I know this because I trust America, and Americans will not stand by for this.

The essence of America is embodied in the likes of Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, and Dr. Martin Lurther King Jr., who has instilled in us the belief, “We as a people, will get to the promised land.”

Thank you to all that made this celebration possible here in our little part of America, especially to the Community Engagement Board of the RBPD for the vision and activism to make this event happen.

Happy MLK Day everyone!

In Redondo Beach 72.91% of the population is White and 3.00% of the population is Black or African American. Still.