The arc of history

I've been troubled lately by how often Martin Luther King's quote "The arc of history is long but it bends towards justice" has been invoked in the Proposition 8 aftermath. It was something nagging at me that I couldn't quite name, but as I marched with a surprisingly small clutch of protesters in San Francisco the other day, it started to dawn on me. And then I went looking up the quote on line and found that Dr. King actually said something different:

"Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice."

Apparently in later speeches he would drop in "history" for "moral universe" on occasion, but I think it's still valuable to judge the line as it first came to him.

The moral universe is a very different thing from history. It seems to me that history is made up of events, of narratives we tell ourselves about whatever culture we belong too. Despite all of the serious scholarship in this area that would make you think it's a purely academic pursuit, it is essentially a story we want to tell ourselves. The moral universe is something else again. It's something distinctly human and that seemingly can exist separate from events. For instance, you could say that World War 2 was hardly bending history towards justice. It was truly horrible on that level. On the other hand, the moral universe was heightened during the war, with as many raising the level of their moral action in the face of such immorality. Anyway, it's a loose concept, and I'm sure it's got holes.

But my real point about this is that talking about history having an arc that bend towards justice seems like a capitulation to me. A way to stay passive and complacent, and yet still to consider oneself moral. You can read the news, be outraged, and then assuaged that eventually good will prevail. Not that one has to create good, or to bend history oneself, but that history bends towards justice of its own will. Even the added timespan of "long", is reassuring. It gives you the sense that you might not even see it in your lifetime, but justice will happen, so you don't have to feel bad about it right now. As I looked over the meager and easily distracted crowd in Yerba Buena Gardens and heard several speakers refer to King's quote, it seemed that was exactly the wrong mood to put people in. In fact, the arc of history itself points where we tell it to. If it's a story our culture tells, than it's made up of our actions, the same as your stories about jumping in a lake naked on New Year's Eve are your history. And if your actions are standing around and watching while waiting for history to bend, that will be where history will go.

There's also a massive assumption implied that there is an arc to history at all. Imagine you are a Native American. How would that quote sound to you? Does history really bend towards justice? For whom?

As a documentary filmmaker, I constantly have to re-address the idea of history/story/reality. And I do believe in the power of stories. I just don't believe they all bend one way or the other.

I can, however, accept that the moral universe always (or at least mostly) bends towards justice. Our revulsion and horror at what was done to Native Americans has certainly changed how we perceive native peoples and made it very difficult to be an openly imperial power. While it's doubtful the Muwekma Ohlone will be given back San Francisco any time soon, morally we are a different people than those who took the land in the first place. But it took massacres and genocide and eventually hard scholarship and activism to bring about this moral arc. Is this the route we yearn for with gay rights and gay marriage?

This was really heightened for me today with reports that many gay rights groups are angry about a federal suit brought by two prominent lawyers on behalf of some California couples who want to get married. They feel like it's a disastruous move, giving the conservative Supreme Court a chance to set back gay rights decades. They want to go to the ballot and work on changing minds and hearts and winning state by state. On a certain level, I really understand that thinking, why risk a total shutdown when so many small victories have piled up recently?

On the other hand, I heard a lot of speeches go like this on Tuesday:

"Are we ready to fight to get a ballot measure passed in 2010 or 2012?!"

That has to be the least inspiring line of all time. A couple loves each other. They want to get married. Now. How does that speak to them? The either/or of it is almost comically terrible. Here's another great quote from Dr. King as long as we're slinging those around:

"For years now I have heard the word 'Wait!' It rings in the ear of every Negro with a piercing familiarity. This 'wait' has almost always meant 'never.'"

I think it's wonderful that people are working on a ballot measure...taking the long view, the more they get out in public and speak to this issue, and the more young people (who don't give a shit) take over our culture, the more likely a distant ballot measure will be to succeed. But why be upset by other efforts going on now? If the Supreme Court is going to constitutionalize inequality, than this shit will be flushed out in the open. There's no sense in hoping big daddy SCOTUS doesn't notice you while you work around the margins. This struggle's genesis belongs firmly in the moral universe, but its success rides on how much we are willing to put our bodies on history's wheels and make them turn towards justice. Using Martin Luther King's quote as a way to preach patience ignores the fact that he died because he couldn't wait. And neither should we.