The Man in the Mirror: Social Justice’s Forgotten Hero

The social movements of today are missing a critical element that was core to every movement that’s ever cracked the foundations of injustice: Self Purification.

I have always felt confused at the self-proclaimed love warrior who, drunk out of his mind, holds his beer can to the sky singing “Could you be Loved.” And just when I want to judge him for it, Bob Marley intervenes:

The road of life is rocky and you may stumble too,
So while you point your fingers someone else is judging you)
Love your brotherman!

He’s right.

We have have lost sight of who we are. Some say we are a species with amnesia. I think they’re right.

We swim together in a dark womb until the day we are reborn, awakened, or uplifted to carry out what our purpose is on this planet. A mysterious fear stops us from the first step toward knowing ourselves.

There’s millions of issues to get behind. The internet connects us to every problem on the planet. The best advertised issue gets the most likes.

It’s as if we live together in a jungle that we choose to watch on a 5 inch screen.

And the screen shows the predators killing, the wildfires burning and tribes warring.

We are on our way to Hell through a 5 inch screen.

Where do we even begin?

The Man in the Mirror

How can you “love thy neighbour as thyself” if you don’t even have a conversation with your neighbor?

And when you do have a conversation with your neighbor, do you “refrain from the violence of fist, tongue, or heart?”

Do you contribute couteous words while striving to understand your brothers and sisters on this planet?

Can you say with compassion that the person you disagree with may be doing the best that they can with what they have?

Malcom X said, “Don’t be in a hurry to condemn because he doesn’t do what you do or think as you think or as fast. There was a time when you didn’t know what you know today.”

To complain about injustice while practicing injustice is hypocrisy. As Dr. King said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” And that includes injustice within your own actions, and injustice done unto yourself by yourself.

The greatest leaders of the greatest movements gave their followers an example to follow. The example of self purification.

Malcolm X developed a drug rehabilitation program that took drunks and druggies off the streets of Harlem and turned them into suit-wearing sober rehabilitators. This was the Fruit of Islam.

An injustice

From MLK Jr:

Refrain from the violence of fist, tongue, or heart.

Great leaders lead by example. The greatest leaders practice what they preach.

When you point a finger at someone, how many fingers point at you?

Holding signs and complaining online never changed anything.

Until you start speaking the truth.

You have to start with the injustices of the man in the mirror before you begin to point your fingers at the injustices of others.

And once you begin the process, “Don’t be in a hurry to condemn because he doesn’t do what you do or think as you think or as fast. There was a time when you didn’t know what you know today.”

Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr, Ghandi, Jesus.

Dr. King’s 10 Commandments

Malcolm:

“Don’t be in a hurry to condemn because he doesn’t do what you do or think as you think or as fast. There was a time when you didn’t know what you know today.”

“A race of people is like an individual man; until it uses its own talent, takes pride in its own history, expresses its own culture, affirms its own selfhood, it can never fulfill itself.” — Malcolm X

“Dr. King wants the same thing I want. Freedom.” — Malcolm X

“When a person places the proper value on freedom, there is nothing under the sun that he will not do to acquire that freedom. Whenever you hear a man saying he wants freedom, but in the next breath he is going to tell you what he won’t do to get it, or what he doesn’t believe in doing in order to get it, he doesn’t believe in freedom. A man who believes in freedom will do anything under the sun to acquire . . . or preserve his freedom.” — Malcolm X

Ghandi

“Non-violence implies as complete self-purification as is humanly possible.”

Jesus of Nazareth.

All of these leaders set an example.