tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5167225593714399849.post3537767547739125257..comments2023-09-12T04:56:49.425-05:00Comments on The Disputed Truth: Dr. King Belongs To Us AllForgivenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12017541595181235698noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5167225593714399849.post-69485503989851378022007-10-01T21:00:00.000-05:002007-10-01T21:00:00.000-05:00First of all thank you for your posting your comme...First of all thank you for your posting your comment, I appreciate it and you.<BR/><BR/>Judging from your last name I would hope that if you were related to Mr. Young that you would have acknowledged that fact, not that it matters but it would be full disclosure.<BR/><BR/><I>You wrote, "for a group of Black people to claim...blah blah..." For your information, King Is Ours is multicultural. Check out the names on our petition. They come from China, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Great Britain and other countries. The front team for King Is Ours is Gilbert Young, Clint Button (who is White) and John Castaldo, executive director of the Barre Granite Association (he's also White). Ann Lau is Chinese American, and Dr. Harry Wu is Chinese.</I><BR/><BR/>In the list of your names they all seem to have an agenda that some would say might qualify their participation in the campaign. It appears that either they have a political or financial incentive to their inclusion.<BR/><BR/>The point of my essay was to say that the Chinese artist should not be disqualified because of his nationality or race. If he is the best qualified let him do the job, that is what Dr. King stood for...Forgivenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12017541595181235698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5167225593714399849.post-52028515499405563432007-10-01T18:44:00.000-05:002007-10-01T18:44:00.000-05:00Your blog was very interesting...full of errors, b...Your blog was very interesting...full of errors, but interesting. If you don't know, Gilbert Young is a 66 year old African American artist who paints. He is not a sculptor, so when you implied that this is about money, you were wrong. This is about our history, our culture, and our own legacy. Gilbert's work is considered "socially conscious". For more than 50 years he's created artwork that glorifies the beauty, the history, and the culture of African American people. His art has been in movies, and used as set decorations on television shows. He's been commissioned by organizations nationwide to create commemorative works of art. Procter & Gamble commissioned him to create the Salute to Greatness Award presented annually by the King Center here in Atlanta. Most people know him for a work of art entitled "He Ain't Heavy," which shows a black man reaching over a wall for another man's hand.<BR/><BR/>As Gilbert tells everyone, he is old enough to have witnessed first hand prejudice, bigotry and Jim Crow. He survived it with bitter memories. If you remember history you'll hear only truth when I say that African Americans are not native to this country. We are not immigrants. We did not choose to come here. Our ancestors were brought here by force. Our most indelible footprint in history has been that we as a people are the descendants of those who survived the horrendous institution known as the system of American Slavery. You don't like that we have invoked history, but the situation in Jena tells you it's still here and now. <BR/><BR/>Nearly 8 years ago, a handful of black men went to Congress to ask permission to build a monument to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.--African American man and descendant of slaves. He would be immortalized in a national monument in the capitol city of what is known as the most powerful nation on the planet. His monument would stand throughout time on the National Mall among America's greatest statesmen. African American History would be important to our nation 365 days a year.<BR/><BR/>But through misguidance and greed and ignorance and apathy, a few folk decided to hand this most important commission, this most incredible honor of sculpting the centerpiece of the monument to an artist whose claim to fame are his monuments glorifying the mass murderer Mao Tse Tung. Yixin has created 14 of them. A deal was made for the stone for Dr. King's monument to come from China, quarried using slave labor. The workers have no rights and are not even provided proper masks to keep the killing silica dust from their lungs. No granite company in the USA was even allowed to bid on this project before it was outsourced directly to China, which is why the granite unions have joined King Is Ours. How do you think Dr. King would react to knowing a monument to him was being built with slave labor?<BR/><BR/>The King Foundation board members have one answer, and one answer only, when asked how they allowed such decisions to go forward. They quote a line from King's speech about people being judged by the content of their character. But King used that line often in speeches, in one version it reads "Let us be dissatisfied until men and women, however black they may be, will be judged on the basis of the content of their character..." King was talking about how black people were being treated back then, and are still being treated to this day. He was talking about how he hoped the world would change toward people of color. The word "Negro" is used 14 times in his "Dream" speech. It's interesting how people use erasers on King's speeches, they "bandy around and pull (them) out when it is convenient or profitable." <BR/><BR/>My favorite quote of King's, and the one that fits this situation perfectly is "Injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere." And people from around the world, of every nationality and creed, agree with us, that's why they're signing our petition. So we certainly don't need to "shame black folks" into agreeing with us. This is not about race. It's about right.<BR/><BR/>The artist the King Foundation has chosen did not win any kind of competition. He was recommended by his peers. In fact, he was recommended by the folk the Foundation bought the Chinese granite from. You quote the King Foundation's PR spin that "a majority of people on the monument selection committee are black" and they chose Lei. A few words have been erased from that sentence. It should end with "to serve as subcontractor to the project." The truth is Ed Dwight was the original artist of record for the King monument. He's a black artist, and America's first black astronaut, and he's created monuments all over this country. Dwight was kicked to the curb for criticizing Lei's work.<BR/><BR/>It's true, Dr. King's hope was that someday black people would have the same opportunities as all other people. He hoped African Americans would be able to attend the same schools, worship in the same churches, live in the same neighborhoods, get the same jobs for the same pay as others. You wrote "at the time of his death..." That's a nice way to put it. He was murdered. Assassinated for speaking out. And now we come to this day. Here is our very first (and last?) opportunity to display our culture and heritage in the first ever monument on our National Mall to an African American man and we're being told we're still not good enough. The King Foundation feels there is nothing wrong King's monument being "Made In China." We protest. <BR/><BR/>We at King Is Ours DO care that someone who has sculpted memorials to a mass murderer has been given the honor of sculpting Dr. King. We won't allow someone from a communist country who knows nothing about the Civil Rights Movement, nothing about Dr. King, and nothing about what King stood for to have his named carved into pink(!) Chinese granite in the first monument to an African American national hero in the history of this planet. You wrote, "for a group of Black people to claim...blah blah..." For your information, King Is Ours is multicultural. Check out the names on our petition. They come from China, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Great Britain and other countries. The front team for King Is Ours is Gilbert Young, Clint Button (who is White) and John Castaldo, executive director of the Barre Granite Association (he's also White). Ann Lau is Chinese American, and Dr. Harry Wu is Chinese. They are also on our team and all are proud to say King Is Ours. You should be too.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com