Question:
Line 1-13: What does King's explanation that he does "not wish to speak with Hanoi and the National Liberation Front, But rather to my fellow Americans" Suggest about his purpose in this speech? Why does King use the phrase "my fellow Americans"?
Answer:
Martin Luther King Jr. directed his speech to the American people in an attempt to point out the double standards of the American government and to generate support and empathy towards the cause for which he was already an advocate.
His logic was simple. If the soldiers can fight together, why couldn't' they live together as Americans?
Explanation:
Martin Luther King Jr. was a Civil Rights Spokesperson and Activist. He was an American Baptist preacher until he was assassinated.
The decision by Martin Luther King (MLK) to focus channel his speech towards the American people suggests that the purpose of the speech is to fight the ongoing racism which was prevalent at home.
He saw it as a double standard for the country to create a united military outside of the home front (black and white soldiers alike) when the same people would hardly live together on the same street back in America. His speech also called attention to the fact that it was the poor who were often conscripted into the Army. His speech purports that besides the ongoing racism in the nation, there was also discrimination against the poor folks.
In MLK's speech, he was not speaking to whites nor blacks, but to America. MLK's conviction was that America is for all whether they were Blacks, Whites, Hispanic, Indians, etc.
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