Essay: Martin Luther King Jr. Day should make you uncomfortable

To become beloved, too often Black folks first have to die. And too often, even that isn’t enough.

At this time of year, I wonder how America would celebrate one man in particular today had he lived. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. would have turned 94 last Sunday had an assassin’s bullet not taken his life in Memphis, Tennessee, and I cannot help but think how many people would still be denigrating him were he alive today.

It doesn’t take much conjecture to visualize this. I still remember the fierce opposition to the very idea of an MLK Day, including from the man who eventually made it official. President Ronald Reagan had been an opponent of an official King holiday before eventually signing it into law in 1983. And though many regard King as a kind of American saint, only 55% of respondents to a poll