There’s no time to be neutral

In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech, which still rings as one of our most honored memories of the civil rights movement, to tens of thousands who had gathered in Washington, D.C., for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

1963 is also the year students at UNC began picketing outside businesses on Franklin Street to call for integration.

The power of the civil rights movement was not confined to national demonstrations, but it was also embodied in local action.

While this 50 year anniversary can be one for commemoration and celebration, we must also recognize that today, we also find ourselves at a significant historic juncture.

North Carolina is in the midst of a political crisis, where a majority in the state legislature is currently pushing forth numerous policies that disproportionately harm people of color, youth and the poor.

Legislative proposals to enact a ‘photo ID’ requirement in order to vote have the potential to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians, according to the voter advocacy organization Democracy North Carolina.

Expansion of voting rights was one of the key battles of the civil rights movement, and those hard-fought victories could now be undermined.

The budget proposal Session/2013-03-28 Meeting/UNC_ Strategic Plan and 2013 Budget Recommendations March 28 2013.pdf written by Gov. Pat McCrory and Budget Director Art Pope calls for millions of dollars to be cut from public higher education in N.C.

This massive budget cut would push more than 8,000 UNC-system students off financial aid and raise tuition by thousands of dollars for out-of-state and undocumented students. Accessible, quality public higher education as a bedrock of our state is at risk.

We are not absolved of the same responsibilities that pushed so many youth to act 50 years ago. Communities that are most vulnerable and most silenced by this current slew of regressive policies have not changed.

Though the urgency that inspired so many youth to join the movement for economic justice and civil rights may seem obvious today, we must remember that they too were told it was not yet the right time to take action.

John Lewis was a young leader in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee when he addressed the March on Washington, saying, “To those who have said, ‘Be patient and wait,’ we must say that ‘patience’ is a dirty and nasty word. We cannot be patient; we do not want to be free gradually.”

Let us recognize the developments of a half century. But do not let musings of progress become an outlet to indulge in neutrality.

UNC School of Law professor Gene Nichol writes in a column in The (Raleigh) News and Observer, “An outraged citizenry is now obliged to rise in order to protect its children, its future and its shared bond. That can’t wait for the next electoral season. It’ll be too late. See you in the streets.”