Riding
Coretta Scott King’s Wings: Martin’s Love, And Our Same Gender Loving
Folk-Hero
As I marinate over the authentic activist life of
Coretta Scott King and mourn her death, I am disgusted with myself with how
little attention I have paid her. I guess her consistency in support left me
believing she would live on - and on - forever. With that, I had not
followed her movements with the gusto one should.
She was so worthy of my monitoring her movements like a puppy-dog with her
pointedly affirming declarations about all things Same Gender Loving. But,
what made her incredible was her willingness to return to the microphone
exercising the muscle of her views time and time again. In essence, she made
sure none would ever successfully misconstrue or disclaim her position.
These are the actions of a genuine hero – a woman who was unabashedly
willing to not only speak out, but pound and scrape for what is decent and
right.
An executive editor of a Black online publication who recently penned a
scurrilous article opposing Black Same Sex Loving taxpayers – taunted me
with his plan to speak to his “last breath” his opposition to our love. I
asked him among other things to consider the true measure of courage is not
to stretch one’s body of conviction along the grain, but rather against it.
Dr. King’s love, and our folk-hero, Coretta Scott King did just that with
decisive valor and a superb sense of consciousness; and she did so to her
“last breath.”
She said it all, and she did in clear, resonant plain-speak. At one point
she reported better than a chief census-taker that Same Gender Loving folk,
“have worked as hard as any group, paid their taxes like everyone else, and
yet have been denied equal protection under the law." At still another,
Scott King urged, “I appeal to everyone who believes in Martin Luther King
Jr.'s dream to make room at the table of brother - and sisterhood for
lesbian and gay people."
She reminded Black amnesiacs, many of whom were anemic and timid during the
Civil Rights Movement, that "Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in
Montgomery, Selma, in Albany, Ga. and St. Augustine, Fla., and many other
campaigns” for justice. She paid tribute, saying, “Many of these courageous
men and women were fighting for my freedom at a time when they could find
few voices for their own, and I salute their contributions."
She reminded the forgetful among us that the usage of terminology such as
“special rights” with respect to Same Gender Loving people is “ironically,
the same language used as far back as 1882 - to oppose civil rights for
former slaves.” She explained that “basic rights” should never be allowed to
be weakened to mere “special rights.”
What I think Coretta Scott King understood was that there is a universal
language of bigotry that stretches heretofore and beyond – from racist’s
banter, sexist roughneck diatribe, to anti-Same Gender Loving shrill. She
understood that whether people who want to claim God use it, racists wield
it, or patriarchal maniacs spew it – it all rounds out to the exact same
number.
Moreover, no matter what Dr. King otherwise might have done, Coretta Scott
King was the woman-sistah’ who he loved and continually reported for duty
to. She was his proven lieutenant in his adult life-time non-violent
struggle of resistance and child rearing. It was she far more than all the
speculators who knew his philosophical heart of hearts. If Coretta Scott
King, Martin’s love, and our folk-hero publicly surmised that her man would
have stood by this principled cause - no questions asked - then no
contradicting funeral venue, no ordained offspring banter, bigotry or bile,
no high-level faith-based pusher-man, and no improper or non-corresponding
eulogy will ever be able to alter that reality. We and our allies can hold
steady in the knowledge that the devil will never acquire the reach to clip
our angel’s wings.
About Terry Howcott
Terry Howcott is a Master of Social Work, Lecturer,
Activist, Thinker, and Writer. She resides in Detroit, MI and can be reached
at
www.terryhowcott.com coming soon.
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