Malcolm X spoke of this phrase in his speeches: the ballot or the bullet.
His speeches resonated with the African-American plight in the 1960s, a plight that included disenfranchisement, poverty, government corruption and inaction. He spoke to generations of the oppressed.
And in a time of money overturning our votes, wealth inequality, and government corruption and inaction, yes: it's time to revisit this promise, that of the ballot or the bullet.
We are the generation of the oppressed.
Some of it is our own doing: we have sat idly by far too long, allowing our politicians to play their cruel games with our incomes, our rights, our lives. We have turned away disinterested, disgusted with the course of national politics. We have turned against each other, hoping to eke by through stealing another poor man's food, placing his stale bread on our table.
We are the starved rats, fighting each other over the crumbs left us.
We cannot afford this infighting and this division any longer.
We cannot blame ourselves any longer.
We, the generation of the oppressed, must step up. We must politically fight our battles. We must wrest back from those in power our enfranchisement; our work, our labor; our government, our self-government.
We cannot sit back and say, "this system works for me; it must work for my hungry brother and sister."
We cannot sit back and say, "this system does not work for me; there is nothing I can do to fix it."
We cannot sit back and say, "this system has not failed those who are starving; it has not failed those who work 50 hours a week and cannot make bills; it has not failed those abandoned veterans shaking small change on the streets."
We cannot sit back.
Our Constitution has promised us two gifts: the ballot and the bullet.
Let us strive for the ballot. That is the greatest gift our forefathers have given us. They have seen the cruelty oligarchies have leveled upon their people. They have seen the blindness and rage with which unbridled greed governs. They have seen the good and the worthy trampled upon, and the righteous dead.
We have now $21 Trillion in debt; more than half our country cannot put together $1000 for medical expenses or rent. We have a Congress dialing for donors harder than they govern our country. Our leaders tax us for Social Security and Medicare, and are gutting them for their own tax breaks as we speak.
Now we must speak. It is our turn to speak. We are taking up the ballot; this is indisputable. Across our country we are speaking up; we are marching alongside; we are voting and checking the power held by corrupt Democrats and Republicans.
Let us aim for it, let us strive for the ballot. For, as Malcolm X said, our only other option is the bullet.
-MK
