Osler's Razor

Yesterday morning, I went to Minneapolis's gigantic MLK breakfast. 2500 people were there, including both Minnesota Senators, a bunch of Congresspeople, and a fun bunch of people from my school. The speaker was Don Lemon, who both like and kind of know a little bit.

I left the event glad for the time with my friends from school and the pretty good speech by Don Lemon, but disappointed, too.  Like many events celebrating King, the point seemed to be to reduce his message to the easiest, least controversial bits-- basically, "people should be nice to each other." It's a good point--in fact, it is the heart of Jesus's Second Great Commandment-- but it is also one that few people disagree with in principle and which has been articulated already by activists as diverse as Rodney King, Rodney Dangerfield, and Barney the Dinosaur. (I suppose this is one area where it really does not matter if a speaker is black, white or purple). There was, in fact, almost no discussion of race by any of the speakers.

It is at best an incomplete message. King's genius was to reveal deep ugliness in our society. There was an edge to what he said-- just like Jesus had an edge. He challenged convention, named names, and insisted on change in specific ways. He championed the poor. He condemned those who stood by the sidelines. He called out the "teachers of the law" and others who ignored human dignity.

 No one left uncomfortable. And that was wrong.