Posted on 05/08/2003 7:16:02 AM PDT by Cyrano Jones
Ad Campaign Launched for King Memorial
By ELIZABETH WOLFE The Associated Press Wednesday, May 7, 2003; 6:21 PM
WASHINGTON - Halle Berry is escorted to a "colored section" at the back of a restaurant and TV weatherman Al Roker can't find a treadmill that isn't marked "white guests only" in a new ad campaign to raise money for a memorial to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
The public service ads using modern celebrities to portray times past were unveiled Wednesday. They are part of an effort over the next year and a half to raise $40 million needed to break ground on the national memorial to the civil rights leader. The advertisements will be placed on radio and TV as well as in newspapers and magazines.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
1. Aside from the Vietnam Memorial, are any nonpresidents currently memorialized in this manner and place?
2. If this campaign is successful, will they follow up with requests to memorialize other heroes of the civil rights movement? Perhaps Malcolm X, the Honorable Elijah Mohammed, Huey Newton should also be enshrined next to Lincoln, Jefferson, and FDR? Is there room to expand Rushmore?
3. Isn't it about time to admit that the majority of American citizens and businesses have reached the point since the reforms of the 1960's that the examples in the Ads, (Barre being escorted to the black section of the restaurant and Roker unable to find a treadmill not marked "Whites only") are wholly unacceptable and that certainly no businesses would be willing to alienate 15% of the customer base by reenacting such policies?
4. Is it even remotely credible that Al Roker would be inconvenienced by a whites only policy on a treadmill? Wouldn't a whites only desert cart be more likely to disrupt his routine?
I like Al Roker and I don't really mean to pick on him. He seems like a genuinely nice fellow and he's also pretty entertaining. I suppose it's possible the dredging up of bygone era images has awakened in Mr. Roker a heretofore latent interest in fitness. There may be some small gain in this, but I think, on the whole, the advertisements might be a thinly veiled attempt to engender even more fear and loathing between races that, but for the constant efforts of his prospective heirs would have achieved even greater reconciliation a la Dr. King's vision than we already have.
Those who don't learn from history......
Business already discriminate. I think Denny's and Cracker Barrel are recent examples. The growth in foreign-owned businesses has also resulted in some discrimination against blacks. When I worked at a motel, I had an employer (Indian) tell me that she wouldn't hire blacks for office work because "they steal". I imagine most black men can relate incidents at foreign-owned restaurants. Every one I know can.
Think so? Not in the Fifties and early Sixties.
The ads are a joke.
I understand that there are individuals and even individual businesses that may make stupid decisions. If I recall correctly, the civil matter at Cracker Barrel raised a firestorm of bad press, managers were fired and policy was rearticulated from the corporate level to the franchisees. Obviously, the general public outrage was the motivator and this goes to my point. Hotels, restaurants and retail businesses in general are universally crying about falloff in revenue. No one can afford to turn away an identifiably large segment of the population and comments to the management will usually suffice. If not, they suffer the consequences of public disapproval.
Legislation and Government Intervention is not the answer and I believe most people *do* learn from history. Please don't forget that this country, for all it's faults, has essentially led the world in accepting and offering opportunity to diverse races, repealing slavery (my corporate employment situation excepted), and opening the public forum to the views and concerns of minority groups.
This historical upshot is that the majority of government attempts to level the playing field since the 1960's have backfired, increasing the socioeconomic disparities between certain ethnic groups and siphoning funds and political capital to the remaining leaders of an aging civil rights "movement" which had already realized most of its original goals. These leaders have made stunning personal gains largely at the expense of the constituencies they purport to represent.
cj
Wait a second.
The point is specifically that it isn't the 50's and 60's any more. These policies don't exist and would be rejected by the vast majority of Americans at a grass roots level. The tired attempts to impugn the collective will of Americans, who are by and large decent people, by recalling images of segregation era injustices is a red herring. We might just as well begin an argument by asking our audience to picture a return to the Inquisition or to pre-Internet. It makes for a compelling story, but not particularly realistic.
cj
Possibly but it still had to be done. We ran the score up before the field leveled.
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