The Bootstrap Illusion Creates The American Lie

An Address by:
DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, J R . Chicago Freedom Festival The Amphitheatre
Chicago, Illinois
Saturday, March 12, 1966

By The Blackman,​ Who Reads Aloud

A CRUST OF BREAD
AND A CORNER TO SLEEP IN,
A MINUTE TO SMILE
AND AN HOUR TO WEEP IN,
A PINT OF JOY TO A PECK OF TROUBLE,
AND NEVER A LAUGH
THAT THE MOURNS COME DOUBLE,​
AND THIS IS LIFE.

Paul Laurence Dunbar

Recently I had someone young, black, and misinformed provide me this quote:

"That’s a choice at this point tbh. Nobody has to continue living in poverty people choose it now. My mom was born in the hood came from poverty and lives amongst wealthy white people. We don’t have to stay there."

She obviously has been bamboozled into believing that the only reason people choose to live in poverty is because of choice, not circumstance or realistic conditions. How can anyone choose to live in want? We were taught or conditioned to believe that all one needed to succeed is the ability to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, individual effort, the American Exceptionalism Dream. Well, that is indeed an essential factor of the American Lie. Today, we need to listen to the words that Dr. Martin Luther King spoke in March of 1966 discussing the systemic institution of racism that not only denies one his needs but destroys that person's ability to secure or even dream to fulfill his wants and desires. I can choose to live with the affluent all I need to do now is find a suitable corner to reside on. The question is how long before the authorities are called to remove me from my choice habitat?