Where the Martin Luther King, Jr. Remembrance Day Became a Maori War Dance

03 Sep, 2013 by Warner Todd Huston

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There is one final point to make about the event honoring the 50th Anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr’s “I Have a Dream” speech held last week on the steps of the Lincoln Monument in Washington DC. Why the heck were Maori tribesmen invited and why did they perform a Haka, or war dance there? Isn’t MLK an American institution?

Purported Maori tribesmen performing a Haka, war dance

I mean, can you imagine what would have happened in 1963 if those organizing the freedom march on Washington back then would have included a band of tattooed, weapons-carrying, “Maori tribesmen” who performed a dance of WAR replete with screams, grimacing faces, and other such overtly threatening antics?

Rightfully it would have become a controversy that far outshone all the good works done that day.

But, even the threatening nature of a war dance aside, the Maori people aren’t even America nor from an American territory or culture.

What the hell were they doing at that intrinsically American event?

What PC idiot allowed these half naked men to cavort so during the MLK celebration. And, how were they allowed to bring weapons to DC and to wield them on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial?

The inclusion of these purported Maori tribesmen was a childish display of PCism run amuck. The Maori aren’t American and threatening war dances do not belong at a rally honoring the one man in American history most known for peaceful protest.

It was just another example–if perhaps the most outrageous one–of the monumental failure that this event truly was.