Of Civil Rights and Swimming Pools

This is 2012, right?  The Civil Rights movement had its heyday over forty years ago, right?  Segregation has been illegal in this country for decades, has it not?  Yet, somehow, we just haven't gotten it yet!  Perhaps you saw a news item this past weekend out of Ohio.  It seems that the landlord of a Cincinnati apartment complex posted a sign on the swimming pool gate proclaiming "Whites Only."  According to the Associated Press the landlord claimed that chemicals in the hair of a young black girl were making the pool "cloudy" and so he posted the sign in order to keep the pool clean.

I must say, I was shocked.  I shouldn't be.  As Dr. King once said, "Racism is a tenacious evil . . . ."  And so it is.  And on this Martin Luther King holiday, we are reminded yet again that we must continue to speak up and out for those who are denied their basic rights. 

Personally I take comfort in the fact that the above quote is only half of what Dr. King said.  The full quotation (from his book Strength to Love) is as follows:  "Racism is a tenacious evil, but it is not immutable."  It is not unchangeable.  It can be overcome.  But racism will fight back every step of the way.  Signs on fences will keep popping up, and we must see to it that they are taken down.  Not just the signs on pool gates and restaurant windows and schoolhouse doors, but also the signs posted on our hearts and the hearts of those around us.  For even as we fight institutionalized racism, so we must continually guard against it in our own actions and our own lives.

Yes, it is 2012.  Yes the Civil Rights movement had its heyday over forty years ago.  Yes, segregation has been illegal for decades.  But the work is far from done, the dream has yet to be realized in its fullness.

(Photo Credit:  Marion S. Trikoska)