When you think about it, the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. has been severely whitewashed.

试想一下，马丁·路德·金所留下的宝贵遗产已被严重篡改。

My name is Michael Eric Dyson. I’m University professor of Sociology at Georgetown University, and I’m the author of “Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America.”

我是迈克尔·埃里克·戴森，是乔治城大学社会学的教授，也是《那些不能停止的眼泪：一个美国白人该有的启示》的作者。

What I mean by that is that we have completely denied the legitimate radical elements of Martin Luther King Jr.’s image, identity, and ideas.

写这部作品的原因来自于目前我们完全忘记了，马丁·路德·金在他个人形象、身份和观点等多个方面的影响力。

We have frozen him in 1963, where he delivered one of most speeches in American history, the “I Have a Dream” speech that captured the moral aspiration of King but many people have frozen him there, as if he believed that was an achievement, not an aspiration.

我们把他的形象固定在了1963年， 那一年他发表了美国历史上最著名的演说《我有一个梦想》，那次演讲表达了他的精神期待，也让很多人将对他的印象锁定在了那次演讲中， 人们甚至认为那是他的成就，而不关注他其中的期望。

As if we had already in America come to a point where we were no longer judging people by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

让人们觉得，在美国，我们早已不再以肤色评价一个人，而完全凭他的个人魅力。

Now many conservative white brothers and sisters and many radical right-wingers of all races have attempted to distort Martin Luther King Jr’.s memory, to whitewash him of the social context of his racial ideas.

如今很多保守派的白人兄弟姐妹还有很多种族右翼分子试图扭曲人们对于马丁·路德·金的记忆，试图粉饰他在消除种族歧视方面努力的社会背景。

Furthermore, Martin Luther King Jr. was far more radical at the end of his life.

更何况，在马丁·路德·金生命的最后，他变得更有影响力。

Martin Luther King Jr. had more than one speech. Like a great singer, he had more than one album. “I Have a Dream” is a great hit, is a great song, and is a great, if you will, part of his legacy, but he delivered other speeches.

马丁·路德·金不止发表过一篇演说。就像一位著名歌手不止有一部专辑。没错，“我有一个梦想”的确是一次伟大的演讲，是一首经典的颂歌，还可以说是他个人的伟大遗产，但是，他还有很多其他的演讲。

He said, “I saw my dream turn into a nightmare” in another speech.

他还在另外一篇演讲中表示：“我看到我的梦变成了噩梦。”

He talked about the violence in American society and the refusal to acknowledge the humanity of black people.

他谈到过美国的社会暴力，谈到美国社会不愿承认黑人的社会地位。

He talked about riots as the language of the unheard.

他谈到那些不被倾听的人们只能发动暴乱来引起注意。

He spoke to America the day before he was murdered and said, “America, all we ask is that you be true to what you said on paper.” He also began to say that most Americans were unconscious racists.

在他被刺杀的前一天，他表示：“美国，我们所声讨的是，你白纸黑字写下的承诺你要兑现。”同时他还表示，大部分美国人实际上都是潜在的种族歧视者。

He began to challenge the notion that America was racially blind, racially neutral country and he began to argue that many Americans would not come to grips with their own racist beliefs, ideas, and practices.

他开始挑战，挑战人们宣称的美国没有种族歧视，美国是种族中立国的观念；他开始声讨，说许多美国人不会认真对待他们自己的种族主义信仰、思想和实践。

That’s a much more radical Martin Luther King Jr. than we’re used to talking about and listening to, and only when we recover that King, will we recover the full dimension of his radical, if you will, position in American letters and certainly in American leadership culture.

所有这些都不仅仅是我们谈到的和听到的那个马丁·路德·金，我们一旦建立起完整的马丁·路德·金的形象，只要你愿意，我们就会恢复对他整个人在美国文字史上，甚至是美国领袖文化史上有影响力的所有层面。

（来源：爱语吧）