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4.65 AVERAGE
4.65 AVERAGE
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
The only problem with this book is that I wish it would be longer. Eig does a masterful job of showing that King never became radical; he was radical all along. He also shows the flaws which is so need in a world where we make great people of history into sanitized myths. King had struggles, but he never wavered from his truth which should be our truth.
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
An engaging, dynamic telling of MLK’s life. It is a hefty read that dragged a bit over the last 75+ pages but still an impressive feat.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
Excellent overview of King, his life, and how his ideas developed in the years before he was killed.
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
fast-paced
It's always intriguing to me when something terrible (ie racist, xenophobic, homophobic, sexist, etc) happens in the US and people clutch their pearls saying "this isn't who we are!" My brother in Christ, this is exactly who we are. While I will acknowledge that a certain branch of the FBI has likely assisted in catching some serial killers, we all have to agree that the FBI isn't here to protect the common citizen. The more I read, the more this becomes clear. Their website boasts "The FBI, the lead agency for enforcing civil rights law" and this is absolutely laughable after reading this book. The amount of money, time, and manpower they put into trying to discredit MLK in any way, shape, or form (mostly boiling down to infidelity) is absolutely bonkers. Tapping all his home phone lines, hotel phone lines, and surveillance nearly everywhere he went. Name me one KKK member they put this much effort into.
[Side tangent - in 1975 Deputy Associate Director James Adams answered some questions regarding the FBI's 'inability' to curtail the KKK and he is quoted as saying:
"With the Klan coming along, we had situations where the FBI and the Federal Government was almost powerless to act. We had local law enforcement officers in some areas participating in Klan violence." He then goes on to acknowledge that in 1965 there were around 2,000 'informants' of the total 10,000 Klan membership. 20% and you had the 'inability' to act???? Maybe had they put all the resources into stopping RACIST PSYCHOS the way they did into the very people fighting to be protected from said RACIST PSYCHOS they could have stopped the racist psychos. More like, they didn't want to because they agreed with the racist psychos. They knew local police were members in the Klan, they knew that if they passed on the information to said local police nothing would be done with the information because of said Klan membership, yet they sat twiddling their thumbs and kept their 2,000+ informants on the government payroll. Sounds pretty corrupt to me.]
Let alone all the other civil rights activists (Malcolm X, Fred Hampton, Black Panthers) and countless others that they surveilled and had ops like COINTELPRO in order to SHUT DOWN the civil rights movement, and they're trying to take the credit as the lead agency enforcing civil rights? Please bffr, Brenda. Their website also boasts that they are 'dedicated to eliminating organized crime groups'. Well, as we found out in Deal With The Devil: The FBI's Secret Thirty-Year Relationship With A Mafia Killer, they were actually on the side of the organized criminals and helped them carry out 25+ murders, with some of them being ones they themselves (the FBI) put hits out on. Can't trust these hoes.
This was an insightful look into MLK's life, and how hard the crooked FBI and J. Edgar Hoover worked to keep this nation segregated. Let's not forget this was only 60 years ago. A blip in the radar in the history of the world - aka this is all very recent. King was only 39 years old when he was assassinated. It's tragic, and he accomplished so much in his short amount of years. What I do like about this book is that it's not a "MLK was a saint and he was never wrong" kind of thing. While I absolutely do love MLK and think he was a great person, this book wasn't in it to just paint him as a saint. He was flawed, like the rest of us. He was at times severely depressed (who wouldn't be in his shoes) and struggled with mental illness continually.
There's not only a ton of information in here, it is also written in such a beautiful way that relays all the information without feeling dull and dry like textbooks. It also highlights how flawed our education system is because there's so much about MLK that we don't learn about in schools, and how the little we do learn is severely propagandized and meant to keep the current white supremacist order of things. Our government only saw him as a radical threat - Hoover even saying "I hope this son of a bitch doesn't die. If he does, they'll make a martyr out of him." Doesn't sound like an organization that cares about civil rights, does it?
Definitely looking forward to reading more of Eig's work.
[Side tangent - in 1975 Deputy Associate Director James Adams answered some questions regarding the FBI's 'inability' to curtail the KKK and he is quoted as saying:
"With the Klan coming along, we had situations where the FBI and the Federal Government was almost powerless to act. We had local law enforcement officers in some areas participating in Klan violence." He then goes on to acknowledge that in 1965 there were around 2,000 'informants' of the total 10,000 Klan membership. 20% and you had the 'inability' to act???? Maybe had they put all the resources into stopping RACIST PSYCHOS the way they did into the very people fighting to be protected from said RACIST PSYCHOS they could have stopped the racist psychos. More like, they didn't want to because they agreed with the racist psychos. They knew local police were members in the Klan, they knew that if they passed on the information to said local police nothing would be done with the information because of said Klan membership, yet they sat twiddling their thumbs and kept their 2,000+ informants on the government payroll. Sounds pretty corrupt to me.]
Let alone all the other civil rights activists (Malcolm X, Fred Hampton, Black Panthers) and countless others that they surveilled and had ops like COINTELPRO in order to SHUT DOWN the civil rights movement, and they're trying to take the credit as the lead agency enforcing civil rights? Please bffr, Brenda. Their website also boasts that they are 'dedicated to eliminating organized crime groups'. Well, as we found out in Deal With The Devil: The FBI's Secret Thirty-Year Relationship With A Mafia Killer, they were actually on the side of the organized criminals and helped them carry out 25+ murders, with some of them being ones they themselves (the FBI) put hits out on. Can't trust these hoes.
This was an insightful look into MLK's life, and how hard the crooked FBI and J. Edgar Hoover worked to keep this nation segregated. Let's not forget this was only 60 years ago. A blip in the radar in the history of the world - aka this is all very recent. King was only 39 years old when he was assassinated. It's tragic, and he accomplished so much in his short amount of years. What I do like about this book is that it's not a "MLK was a saint and he was never wrong" kind of thing. While I absolutely do love MLK and think he was a great person, this book wasn't in it to just paint him as a saint. He was flawed, like the rest of us. He was at times severely depressed (who wouldn't be in his shoes) and struggled with mental illness continually.
There's not only a ton of information in here, it is also written in such a beautiful way that relays all the information without feeling dull and dry like textbooks. It also highlights how flawed our education system is because there's so much about MLK that we don't learn about in schools, and how the little we do learn is severely propagandized and meant to keep the current white supremacist order of things. Our government only saw him as a radical threat - Hoover even saying "I hope this son of a bitch doesn't die. If he does, they'll make a martyr out of him." Doesn't sound like an organization that cares about civil rights, does it?
Definitely looking forward to reading more of Eig's work.
This is a great book, carefully exploring the complexities and flaws of MLK as well as the civil rights movement in the 1960s. It carefully places King in the context of the politics of the time, the relationships with other members of the civil rights movement, and the black community more broadly. The author ends with a challenge to learn about King’s writing and to go beyond the simplified version we tend to learn and hear about. Highly recommend.