{"id":205,"date":"2022-09-21T20:19:18","date_gmt":"2022-09-21T20:19:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/?p=205"},"modified":"2022-09-24T13:46:05","modified_gmt":"2022-09-24T13:46:05","slug":"why-are-we-still-dreaming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/?p=205","title":{"rendered":"Why Are We Still Dreaming?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong><em>Dreaming &#8211; <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>1.experience dreams during sleep.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>2.indulge in daydreams or fantasies about something greatly desired.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">Every year since his assassination, we honor the life, legacy and achievements of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Through speech, song, pageantry our children step up to microphones all over America to recite Dr. King\u2019s most famous speech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">I was one of those children. in 1975, seven years after his murder, I was chosen to deliver the iconic \u201cI have a dream\u201d speech for our annual assembly honoring the civil rights leader. I remember listening to the speech hundreds of times trying to pick up every nuance, trying to match the tenor and inflection of his voice, trying to match his cadence with my cracking 13-year-old voice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">On the day of the assembly, I delivered my rendition, receiving a standing ovation from the diverse audience of my peers, a few parents, and teachers (I was part of the first desegregated class in Evanston public schools). The same Evanston that recently made national news for approving \u201cReparations\u201d \u2026a story for another time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">Mr. Patterson, the first Black male teacher I every had, who taught Language Arts and Mrs. Williams, the Home Econ teacher met me in the wings with tears streaming down their collective faces saying how proud they were, praising my performance. I think the following Sunday, I was asked to deliver the oratory again in church to a flurry of Amens and praise Gods\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">After 47 years, while listening to a news piece this morning about the Foley &amp; Lardner, LLP \u2013 Martin Luther King, Jr. Oratory Competition. I was struck by the question; why are we still dreaming about civil rights, equality, and justice? What bothered me most was this Lilly white law firm has been hosting a competition for little Black 4<sup>th<\/sup> &amp; 5<sup>th<\/sup> graders being judged on how well they articulate, with this year\u2019s topic \u201cHow would Dr. King assess our progress in achieving his vision for America?\u201d If this ain\u2019t some Richard Wright \u2013 Invisible Man shit, I don\u2019t know what else is!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-justify\">A representative from the Disney Dreamers Academy said, \u201cA wish is something you have to hope for, a dream is something you pursue.\u201d Today, as the nation celebrates Dr. King, we must ask ourselves are we any closer to his dream when we are no closer to a voting rights act? Or are we just wishing that systematic racism and the ongoing efforts of racists to oppress us will just disappear?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dreaming &#8211; 1.experience dreams during sleep. 2.indulge in daydreams or fantasies about something greatly desired. Every year since his assassination, we honor the life,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10,3,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-race","category-society"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=205"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":206,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205\/revisions\/206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackmanwrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}