You want a Race

You call me a Meskin.
Please don't call me a Mezkin.
I am a Mexicano, a Chicano, A Mex-i-can-American.
You are an African American.  You are Black.
I am proud.  You are proud.
But, if you call me a Meskin, I feel like calling you a N.
But I won't.  I am not about to cause a race war.
I have too much respect for what
Real men have fought for
For what real men and women have been through.
The violence must end,
And I am not an instigator,
I have learned well from Martin, from César, from Mahatma.
I am proud to be a pacifist.
CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE.
We need to be brothers, but
Please don't call me a Mescan,
Or a Cholo, Or a wetback, Or an illegal.
Have respect for me.  For I can have no respect,
Zero respect, for any one who has no respect for me.
Mayate, I will never call to you to harm you.
I am a brother.  Accept my open arms.
Do not call me a Mesz-Kin, but rather
Call me Brother.


Monday, January 23, 1995.



---- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

 It has played havoc with our domestic destinies. This day we are spending five hundred thousand dollars to kill 
every Vietcong soldier. Every time we kill one we spend about five hundred thousand dollars while we spend only 
fifty-three dollars a year for every person characterized as poverty-stricken in the so-called poverty program, 
which is not even a good skirmish against poverty.


 We must move past indecision to action. We must find new ways to speak for peace in Vietnam and for justice 
throughout the developing world, a world that borders on our doors. If we do not act, we shall surely be dragged 
down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time reserved for those who possess power without compassion, might 
without morality, and strength without sight.

--Martin Luther King, Jr., "CONSCIENCE AND THE VIETNAM WAR" in The Trumpet of Conscience (1968) 

"Why I Am Opposed to the War."

Now, let me make it clear in the beginning, that I see this war as an unjust, evil, and futile war.