misdreavus
New member
In my english class, we had to do an editorial about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s speech, "I Have A Dream." I thought I'd share it here.
On August 28th, 1963, he made a now-famous speech in Washington, D.C. That speech was about a dream he had. His dream was about a nation where everyone is free, and no one is judged by their skin color, or what they look like in general. The speech he made that day really opened my eyes up about history. It angers me that people were treated so cruelly because of the color of their skin. I don’t understand why most white people in the south felt they could be so mean to black people because their skin is different. “But,” I hear many people say today, “We as a nation have learned a lot about human rights since then.” While part of this statement may be true, history never repeats itself, right? Wrong.
Reading this speech made me think of how we continue to treat people today who look different. Let me tell you about a friend of mine. His birthday is on September 11th. As you know, your driver’s license expires on your birthday about 8 years after it is issued to you. Now, my friend likes to garden. He has all kinds of exotic plants in his garden, many of which need fertilizer to grow. He went to the Home Depot store to buy more fertilizer. It was a few days after September 11th, 2001.
For some reason the clerk at the register asked to see his driver’s license. My friend is Palestinian, and the day they took his picture at the DMV, he still had a beard. He was wearing his glasses that day, and had just recently moved back to the United States (he has dual citizenship). His driver’s license had expired on September 11th, which, as I said earlier, were just a few days before. The clerk assumed he was a terrorist. She pushed the panic button on the register behind her. After all, what does a Palestinian man need gardening fertilizer for? (surely not to garden?) He was humiliated by the experience.
But it is not just everyday people who get treated like terrorists because they look different. Celebrities get that treatment too. They have money. They have enough money to pay for many luxuries, including plastic surgery. Some of them are chastised for supposedly going overboard with surgery. So what? Does it really matter how many plastic surgeries Michael Jackson had (or didn’t have) on his nose? Even if you don’t like him, ask yourself if he really deserves to be treated like dirt by the media because he wears make-up to cover up spots left from a skin disease that ate the pigmentation of his skin. No one deserves to be treated by the media like that.
While the treatment of celebrities and non-celebrities who look different today is a far cry from the way black people were treated in the 1960s, it seems that we still feel we can dehumanize people who look different. Perhaps we still have a few things to learn from Dr. King. Many of us, especially those in the media, need to learn that no one deserves to be harassed or humiliated for being-or looking-different. No one deserves to be judged by the color of their skin (or the loss of it.) But hopefully history will never forget about the dream one black man had about a free–and equal–nation, and the sacrifices he made to make that dream become a reality.
“I have a dream.” Remember those words? Those words were spoken by a man who had a dream about freedom and equality. The same man who spoke those words stood up for the rights and freedom of his people, even when he was jailed for speaking about the suffering of his people. His name was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was a father, a minister, and a very powerful public speaker.On August 28th, 1963, he made a now-famous speech in Washington, D.C. That speech was about a dream he had. His dream was about a nation where everyone is free, and no one is judged by their skin color, or what they look like in general. The speech he made that day really opened my eyes up about history. It angers me that people were treated so cruelly because of the color of their skin. I don’t understand why most white people in the south felt they could be so mean to black people because their skin is different. “But,” I hear many people say today, “We as a nation have learned a lot about human rights since then.” While part of this statement may be true, history never repeats itself, right? Wrong.
Reading this speech made me think of how we continue to treat people today who look different. Let me tell you about a friend of mine. His birthday is on September 11th. As you know, your driver’s license expires on your birthday about 8 years after it is issued to you. Now, my friend likes to garden. He has all kinds of exotic plants in his garden, many of which need fertilizer to grow. He went to the Home Depot store to buy more fertilizer. It was a few days after September 11th, 2001.
For some reason the clerk at the register asked to see his driver’s license. My friend is Palestinian, and the day they took his picture at the DMV, he still had a beard. He was wearing his glasses that day, and had just recently moved back to the United States (he has dual citizenship). His driver’s license had expired on September 11th, which, as I said earlier, were just a few days before. The clerk assumed he was a terrorist. She pushed the panic button on the register behind her. After all, what does a Palestinian man need gardening fertilizer for? (surely not to garden?) He was humiliated by the experience.
But it is not just everyday people who get treated like terrorists because they look different. Celebrities get that treatment too. They have money. They have enough money to pay for many luxuries, including plastic surgery. Some of them are chastised for supposedly going overboard with surgery. So what? Does it really matter how many plastic surgeries Michael Jackson had (or didn’t have) on his nose? Even if you don’t like him, ask yourself if he really deserves to be treated like dirt by the media because he wears make-up to cover up spots left from a skin disease that ate the pigmentation of his skin. No one deserves to be treated by the media like that.
While the treatment of celebrities and non-celebrities who look different today is a far cry from the way black people were treated in the 1960s, it seems that we still feel we can dehumanize people who look different. Perhaps we still have a few things to learn from Dr. King. Many of us, especially those in the media, need to learn that no one deserves to be harassed or humiliated for being-or looking-different. No one deserves to be judged by the color of their skin (or the loss of it.) But hopefully history will never forget about the dream one black man had about a free–and equal–nation, and the sacrifices he made to make that dream become a reality.