King on Antidotes for Fear
Thomas Allen
In "Antidotes for Fear," Strength to Love (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1963, 2010), pages 119–132, Martin Luther King, Jr. discusses fear, courage, love, faith, and social justice. The following is a critical review of King’s essay.
King begins with a discussion of fear crippling people, which for the most part is accurate. Overcoming fear is the theme of this essay. “Everywhere men and women are confronted by fears that often appear in strange disguises and a variety of wardrobes.” (P. 119.) Such fears include bad health, aging, insecurity, inferiority complex, and failure. Then, he comments, “A fear of what life may bring encourages some persons to wander aimlessly along the frittering road of excessive drink and sexual promiscuity.” (P. 120.) (King must have been a frightened man because he wondered the road of sexual promiscuity.) He remarks that “many people have permitted fear to transform the sunrise of love and peace into a sunset of inner depression.” (P. 120.)
Continuing, King notes that economic fears are common. Business owners fear failure, and employees fear unemployment.
Other fears are the fear of death and the fear of racial annihilation. (Since King promoted miscegenation, which leads to racial annihilation, that he would mention it as a fear is strange. Today, the only race facing annihilation is the White race. Yet, most do not fear their annihilation — probably because they are living in denial. Further, many Whites are so Albusphobic that they look forward to their annihilation.)
Then, King comments on the fear of nuclear war. It has terrorized people to build fallout shelters while urging the government to increase the stockpile of nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, the quest to maintain “a balance of terror” only increases fear.
Although “fear drains a man’s energy and depletes his resources,” (p. 120) man should not seek to eliminate fear completely. King notes that fear warns of approaching danger and is, therefore, necessary for survival. Moreover, it is a powerful force. “If man were to lose his capacity to fear, he would be deprived of his capacity to grow, invent, and create.” (P. 121.) However, “abnormal fears are emotionally ruinous and psychologically destructive.” (P. 121.) Continuing, he remarks, “Normal fear protects us; abnormal fear paralyzes us.” (P. 121.)
To overcome abnormal fear, a person must seek its cause. Once the cause is discovered, then he may overcome his fear with courage. Then, King discusses courage, which “is the power of the mind to overcome fear.” (P. 123.)
Next, King contrasts courage and cowardice. “Courage breeds creative self-affirmation; cowardice produces destructive self-abnegation. Courage faces fear and thereby masters it; cowardice represses fear and is thereby mastered by it.” (P. 124.)
Continuing, King states that “fear is mastered through love.” (P. 124.) Then, he claims, “Hate is rooted in fear, and the only cure for fear-hate is love.” (P. 124.)
Next, King notes that fear is a major cause of war. This fear leads to hate, which in turn leads to war, which leads to greater hate. (The hostility between the Jews and Palestinians is an excellent example of King’s observation. Moreover, what he writes here can also be applied to personal relationships.) To King, the solution to war is love. “Only disarmament, based on good faith, will make mutual trust a living reality.” (P. 125.)
Furthermore, fear-hate leads to hostility between the races. King asserts that love is the solution to ending racial hostility. (Although King preached a great deal about love and its virtues and seemed to have a good understanding of love, he was a failure at practicing it. If he truly loved, he would not have destroyed the South and later the United States to achieve his vain ambition.)
Continuing, King discusses what he calls social justice. Love is the solution to social justice. Then, he declares, “Racial segregation is buttressed by such irrational fears as loss of preferred economic privilege, altered social status, intermarriage, and adjustment to new situations.” (P. 125.) (These fears have all come to pass. Whatever preferred economic privileges that Whites had have long vanished. Now, with quotas and affirmative action, Negroes have more preferred economic privileges than Whites ever had. Today, unqualified Negroes are hired instead of qualified Whites. Now, Negroes have a higher social status than Whites. Proof: Negroes used to try to pass as Whites. Today, Whites try to pass as Negroes. Since the Supreme Court’s unconstitutional ruling in Loving v. Virginia (1967), which nullified miscegenation laws, interracial marriages have increased significantly. [See "Interracial Marriages" by Thomas Allen.] Consequently, Negroes and Whites are genociding each other via miscegenation.)
Then, King discusses some of the techniques that Whites used to avoid his program of forced integration. “[S]ome seek to ignore the question of race relations and to close their mind to the issues involved.” (P. 125.) Others, using “such legal maneuvers as interposition and nullification, counsel massive resistance.” (P. 125.) (King counseled illegal massive resistance against segregation. Thus, the segregationists were merely following King, except they were using legal tactics. He should have been proud of them. Instead, he despised them.) Still, others resorted to violence against Negroes. (These segregationists were merely following the tactics of civil rights leaders who resorted to violence against Whites. King seldom objected to violence against segregationists.)
King blames the country’s racial problems on the fear of Whites. If Whites “are to master fear, they must depend not only on their commitment to Christian love but also on the Christlike love that the Negro generates toward them.” (Pp. 125-126.) (I do not know whether King is deceiving himself or is lying to deceive Whites. Most likely, it is the latter. One thing that the Negroes who follow King have not done is to show Christlike love toward Whites. Christlike love does not lead to riots, the destruction of property, and the deaths of innocent people — acts that Negroes have been notorious for committing against Whites since the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Christlike love does not promote the genocide of Whites. That King would have actively opposed these acts of violence against Whites is highly unlikely since he supported violent acts — contrary to his assertions of being a man of peace. Most likely, he would have endorsed and promoted them. Other than King-idolizing conservatives, who lack any functioning brain cells when it comes to race, does anyone with a functioning brain cell believe that King would have opposed Black Lives Matter protestors? No, he would have supported them and their violence as did all liberals and many conservatives.)
Then, King writes, “A guilt-ridden white minority fears that if the Negro attains power, he will without restraint or pity act to revenge the accumulated injustices and brutality of the years.” (P. 126.) (When the Negro attained power, revenge is what he sought. Negroes have used their power against Whites since the beginning of the Civil Rights Era. Much of this revenge is concealed in crime. [See “The Dirty War: America’s Race War” by Thomas Allen.] Some of it is open like the Black Lives Matter riots and the destruction of statues. Moreover, many Whites have joined the Negro in his revenge against their White brothers. These acts of violence prove that Whites who fear that Negroes would use their power for revenge were correct.)
Next, King writes, “The Negro must show them that they have nothing to fear, for the Negro forgives and is willing to forget the past. The Negro must convince the white man that he seeks justice for both himself and the white man.” (P. 126.) (The Negro has failed. Most Negroes have shown no forgiveness or willingness to forget the past as the wanton destruction of statues and memorials and the renaming of buildings in the South proves. Moreover, Negroes have not sought justice for Whites as the conviction of Derek Chauvin and other innocent Whites prove.)
King declares that he knows the cure for the fear of integration: love. Moreover, he claims that God is on his side (although the Bible endorses segregation and denounces integration and amalgamation).
Continuing, King states that “fear is mastered through faith.” (P. 127.) Deficiency of resources and inadequacy of life lead to fear. Then, he discusses the importance of positive religious faith and what it offers and does not offer. Also, he discusses the inadequacy of irreligion. He notes that a positive religious faith overcomes the fear of death.
In closing, King comments briefly on the Montgomery bus protest and Mother Pollard.
In this essay, King discusses four essential components in conquering fear: (1) discovering the cause of the fear, (2) having the courage to overcome the fear, (3) mastering the fear through love, and (4) mastering the fear through faith. However, he errs greatly when discussing the fear that segregationists had (their fears prove valid) and the loving, forgiving attitude of Negroes (most of whom lack a loving, forgiving attitude).
Although King could preach a good sermon, he drew the wrong conclusion concerning what he called social justice. Southerners and segregationists are not as evil as he presents them. His erroneous conclusion derives from his erroneous understanding of the Bible. Contrary to what he claims, the Bible does not support integration; it supports segregation.
Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.
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