Dr Martin L. King Jr.: Where are we at with the dream today?

I wish that all of us could follow his dream but we are too busy trying to hate each other instead of realizing we are American first no matter race or creed. Once people realize this the better we will be stop the divide. When I was in there was no distinction between races we were all one color Green that's how I still view everyone today

I think we are stuck in the two steps forward and one step back, so basically we are stuck in neutral.

We have a hard time progressing because of attitudes of "I can't get ahead because (fill in the blank)", "No one wants to give me a chance because I'm (fill in the blank)", or any other number of excuses. All people need to stop with excuses and work towards bettering themselves.

Activists want to scream at the top of their lungs about police brutality, about no opportunities, about communities where the poor stay poor. They want change but they won't make any changes themselves to get ahead.

You hear constantly about a lack of minorities in law enforcement and fire departments. The question has to be asked is why is that? Are the minorities even applying for those jobs? You cannot be in law enforcement or in the fire department if you don't apply.

I hate seeing people, especially celebrities, sports figures or other public figures, wearing the "I can't breathe" or "Hands up don't shoot" t-shirts. While the point is to get a message across, to me its a lost point because those people for the most part don't have a clue as to how bad or how hard it is living in the lower classes, or if they did they have lost touch. But the biggest issue is that they don't do anything to make those communities better, they say they support change but what do they do except sit back, grumble and collect their huge paychecks.

Equality is never really going to happen because not everyone is equally wealthy, equally healthy or equally intelligent. There are millions of opportunities available for anyone if they are willing to go for it.

The ways of Dr. King were the correct way, because look at what happened, a group of black men, women and children peacefully marched, they were verbally and physically assaulted but they did nothing in retaliation, and that infuriated the authority and they dealt with it out of anger which solved nothing because they did not get the response out of the protestors, and that is why things changed, because Dr. King showed that peacefully presenting your agenda gets more results than violence ever will.

Todays loud mouthed antagonists from every corner, be it Rev. Al Sharpton, Rev. Jessie Jackson, The KK wannabes, Skinheads and other agitators only further the divide because they only think about their "people" they have no concern about other people or other causes and that's why they will never make any positive change.

We all have opportunity, its how we take the ball and run or drop the ball and sit back to play the blame game. Its all up to each and every one of us, I saw it in the Navy for 24 years people excelled and people failed because of their own actions or inactions.

In many ways we are progressing and in many ways we are regressing.

On the progress, we see more interracial friendships, relationships, and marriages. Color is becoming more blind. We see minorities in the highest of offices today, certainly a dream in MLK's day.

On the regress, we see many communities hold on race as an excuse to behave badly (i.e. Furgeson protestor's justification of looting of some thug that tried to take down an officer bit a bullet), Trayvon Martin ("If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon"), Chicago, etc. etc. Not to mention the Jesse Jacksons, Al Sharptons, Maxime Waters, Eric Holders, etc. of the country that continue to label and divide us and feed off each other's stereotypes to achieve their own political agendas.

In other ways we are written in law to be divided. Affirmative action may have had its role in the past, but now it's an excuse to have a quota instead of hiring upon merit. Same goes for colleges. Why should we list race on a college/work application? Justice is blind, so should be everything else.

MLK had a dream that we would one day not judge people by the character of their skin but by the content of their character. Unfortunately, political correctness has tainted judging someone's character on the fear of becoming labeled a racist, sexist, etc.

Maybe one day we'll all get to a point where the dream is truly reached. I honestly doubt it will ever really happen, but striving for that dream and working with one another, old, young, rich, poor, black, white, brown, yellow, or purple, is just as important.

I believe all lives matter. I believe we have regressed and I also believe that politics has something to do with. I believe in self responsibility and self actualization regardless of what your skin color is, I still believe that a persons content of their character will always be more important then a persons skin color. Semper Fidelis

I don't feel very qualified to judge this. The military does strike me as pretty meritocratic and moderately 'colorblind.' Content of character not color of skin and all.

We are a long ways off, IMO. Part of that has to do with the fact that we are still human, and we still have prejudices to deal with. Part of it has to do with the fact that we as a nation seem to believe that we can legislate racism out of existence. We are putting more power into the hands of our government and that takes that power away from us. But that's another story.

We will move toward racial harmony when we change our own personal views on people of other races. I know I am not there yet, because I still have prejudicial thoughts that shame me to this very day. It's a day by day process for all of us.

Our Nation's Creed and Solidarity are years beyond what we endured in the 50-70's. But one lesson our Country must learn is that We still need to grow and broaden our minds on Equality. We all have room to grow and learn. Learning is one thing we never stop doing until the day we Die. Tolerance is blind to truth. Brutal Honesty just may have to stick its ugly head into reality for some people these days.

I think in some areas he would be proud. But I think he would be mostly disappointed and if he could speak now he would probably say "I gave my life for this?"

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-tuskegee-veterans-20150115-story.html

Would this article even been printed during the 60s/70s? Nope! I remember MLK being murdered and JFK and RFK as well. There has been big advancements with more necessary but it is a good start, so we are progressing.