Southern Revival: The Righteous Progressivism of Moral Mondays

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http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/08/01-2



For 13 weeks, the North Carolina state house in Raleigh was the focus of “Moral Mondays” — a progressive movement organized by the state’s NAACP president, Rev. William Barber, in response to what he called North Carolina GOP’s “mean-spirited quadruple attack” on the most vulnerable citizens. The protests organized by Barber, who will be one of the honorees at the Celebrating America’s Future Awards Gala in November, hearken back to the civil rights movement of old. Yet, Moral Mondays may signal the beginnings of a new civil rights movement, fueled by a revival of the moral progressivism of the movement of the 1960s.

A New “Fusion Politics”

What led thousands of people to rally in Raleigh, NC for 13 Mondays, to make the statehouse echo with their singing and praying? What fervor moved more than 900 people to engage in civil disobedience leading to their arrest?

The Moral Mondays protests in North Carolina have captured the attention and the imaginations of progressives all over the country, but the movement itself did not spring up overnight. The movement had its beginnings in 2006, when Rev. Barber and others, recognizing the need for a new form of “fusion politics,” began building the Historic Thousands on Jones Street movement (HKonJ).

“We recognized that many of the same political forces that are against, say, gender rights, are often also against education equality, environmental justice, and policies that help the poor,” Barber said, explaining the beginnings of the Moral Mondays movement. “And so we said that we needed in North Carolina—and we said this is when Democrats were in office—to have a new form of fusion politics if we were going to really address the South.”

[KoKo]

1. This is a good read. "Dandelion Revolution"....and Fusion Politics. K&R!

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2. kick

[KoKo]

3. Kick! For a Hopeful Post in these Down Times... It's a Good Read!