The civil rights movement hasn't ended: We're in a third reconstruction

One of the most powerful speakers I've ever had the opportunity to hear over my more than five decades in the civil rights movement is the Rev. Dr. William Barber, president of the North Carolina NAACP, and chief architect of the Moral Mondays Movement. On Friday, September 25, I will have the opportunity to hear him once again at a Daily Kos event in Asheville, North Carolina. It's free and open to the public. Hopefully many readers will join me there, and if you cannot, then pass the word on.

What is key in the grassroots organizing being spearheaded by Moral Mondays and other activist groups across the nation like #BlackLivesMatter, The Dream Defenders, United We Dream, Overpass Light Brigade, and Gathering for Justice, is that their movements are inextricably linked to past civil and political abuses, but are alive and well now. The Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles has a list with links to many groups continuing the fight for change.

Too many people speak about the struggle for civil rights as if it is something only to be dragged out as part of Black/Women's/Latino History Month and relegated to a poster on the wall, a spot in a museum, or a memorial tribute when an elder passes on. But the movement is alive, growing, linked to a long history, and moving forward into the future. At a time when the drumbeat of dissonant, destructive, racist, and sexist voices are standard fare in the media and given legitimacy by bigots running for elective office, we must cast aside the burial cloak and embrace the immediacy of direct action—now!

Rev. Barber discusses this eloquently on video in The Third Reconstruction, which is also the title of his soon-to-be released book.  

Join me below for the video, and more.