Martin Luther King was a traitor. As was John Brown, Frederick Douglas, Malcolm X, Mandela, Biko, and many many others we admire.

Robert E. Lee was also a traitor, as was Lincoln, as were the US colonists in 1776 and the first settlers leaving England and Holland, as was Sitting Bull, as was Gandhi and Xanana Gusmão and Vaclav Havel and Aung San Suu Kyi and Wang Dan of Tiananmen.

All of these people betrayed their faith and responsibility to something - MLK to his culture and state and region, Lincoln to the constitution, Robert E. Lee to the Union, John Brown to the law, Wang Dan to the police orders of the day.

Jesus was a traitor to rabbinic law and the edicts of Caesar, despite his careful weasel words. Yitzhak Rabin was a traitor to the Zionist cause, or at least the one that said dialog and compromise with the enemy was treason. Martin Luther, MLK's namesake, was a traitor to the Catholic church.

Largely, all of these felt they were serving a more just cause by taking their actions, seldom for personal reasons, even though many of them had less than perfect methods, less than pure motivations, and less than ideal personal lives.

While we think of "traitor" as a pejorative, partly due to Benedict Arnold who was not only a traitor but also a sneak, much of society's progress is carried out by traitors. Dylan was a "traitor" to the folk movement, Solzhenitsyn was a traitor to the totalitarian Soviet system. Galileo wrote his finest works under house arrest for heresy, for undermining the underpinnings of the church and the heliocentric mindset. Daniel Boone's family was thrown out of the community for marrying outside the circle.

But what if we think of two masters? In Lars von Trier's masterpiece Zentropa looking back at the horrific choices through World War II, moral superiority falls on those who made a decision, took a side right or wrong, rather than those who refused to choose, wouldn't get involved. Because action is messy, uncertain, takes courage, has its doubts, often creates horrid side effects, often fails.

It's easy to gloss over Lincoln's effectively killing hundreds of thousands of southerners as the southerners' fault, but that would be an oversimplification and a discredit to the difficult choice he made. He chose one atrocity over another - Civil War and the slaughter over both slavery and disintegration. Only history can really judge, and so far history has judged him well.

While some think of Robert E. Lee as a traitor, others see him as simply a soldier doing what soldiers do (presuming no more wanton atrocity than that always found in war). Yes, he abandoned the Union, certainly his armies were upholding the structures that promoted slavery, but mostly he's seen as doing what the military's main task is - protecting those it's assigned to protect, duty first.

But historical judgments are based on principles - allowing for conditions and beliefs at the time, while updating and modifying to take account of our evolving moral and belief systems. The idea of a Lee not considering slavery in his equation, or of the wonderful Jefferson codifying the new democracy while owning and compromising around slaves are no longer accepted as simply "those were the times".

As we see with the short time since Hiroshima, or the Germans' continuing (and honorable) facing of its Nazi-era crimes, or even our evaluation of cause-and-effect in our Mideast adventures from the state of Israel through Mossadegh through Mujahideen in Afghanistan through Iran-contra through Gulf Wars 1 & 2 through the current morass in Iraq, Syria and Libya - we have too much knowledge to shove things to the past, no more "boys will be boys" dismissal. We have more of a responsibility to get it right before it becomes history, but we seem less and less able to do this with any fortitude, settling for weak compromise to share the blame over resolve and strength of character and acceptance responsibility for mixed consequences.

MLK, whether due to time in jail or the nature of his spirit, seemed to do a lot of thinking, placing things in the right frame of mind and right frame of spirituality, despite the uncertainties of where his actions would lead.

But overall, MLK was a conformist - he fit within the church, he espoused obedience to the law where moral, he was certainly no rabble rouser just for the sake of rousing rabble, and certainly not an anarchist attempting to destroy the temple, but to right it, rid it of its userers and faith healers and other abominations, to make the system function as it said it did. While he pushed the law on the streets, he also pushed the law through the courts - an equal time activist.

MLK shunned violence, which is how his Gandhi-inspired movement won public acceptance over that of Malcolm X and the Black Panthers and more extreme groups (even though actions by Malcolm & the Panthers seem tame compared to even the FBI actions against them). And we appreciate that Mandela's later revolution was peaceful, and Suu Kyi "fought" through study of Buddhism, not guns, and that Gusmão dropped his weapons and negotiated, and that Arafat and Rabin were able to shake hands in peace.

But that's a myopic, revisionist appreciation. The world still functions largely by violence or threat of violence. Crimea is Russia's because Putin had troops, close location and opportunity. Qaddafi is gone primarily from our air power. Iran is bargaining because of our sanctions and military threats (including the steady demise of its neighbors). ISIS gains publicity through its physical atrocities and barbaric marketing appeal. US streets are dominated by overbearing police presence, a significant armed criminal presence after dark, and the consistent NRA-backed pressure of open carry and self-proclaimed patriot nuts. 

Even MLK's movement was carried out with the violent backdrop of Vietnam - knowing that his actions would by hypocritically judged by those bombing the hell out of a long-term colonialized people seeking freedom but with the tainted and compromised flag of communism.

But let's take another revisionist theory and spin it on its head. The Civil War was fought to preserve a Union forcefully - something that's seen today by many as just and deserved, even as we see modern morals as promoting freedom of choice, freedom of association, the right to vote for your destiny. Iraq considered breaking into 3, a possibility generally accepted. Catalonia and Quebec have voted on breakaway independence, Scotland voted for greater autonomy, Czechs and Slovaks split amicably, Yugloslavia broke up messily, Kosovo we bombed into independence, South Sudan split with US & UN help, East Timor broke away largely on its own. Post-WWI and WWII, a massive number of countries from Korea to Azerbaijan to Kenya to Namibia to Bulgaria to Burma to Philippines freed themselves from prior unions. We largely avow the right of people to split away, even as divorce is common and accepted and no longer considered shameful.

But the attitude towards secession in the US remains oddly regressive, oddly primitive. It'd be one thing if we understood that secession was about slavery, but we've never detached our patriotic obligations as well.

It's not hard to see the illogic of this. If slaves had revolted in Mississippi and across Dixie in 1861 and successfully declared Liberia across the south, with a black majority citizenry, it's hard to imagine that anyone would look back and judge them harshly for quitting the Union, or even using violence had they found access to weapons. Few would demand they return to the US for the sake of the Good Ol' USA as seen on TV or promised in Philadelphia.

Nor is the argument that the South "started it" very convincing when separated from slavery. Few heartily justify the US' continued occupation of Guantanamo in Cuba or the UK's holding Gibraltar in Spain, or Spain's holding Ceuta and Melilla in Morocco. If a people have a right to secede, they also have a right not to have the split party remain in their bedroom, in the middle of their harbor, or in the case of Gaza and the West Bank, controlling all their imports & exports, comings and goings.

But this logic for some reason escapes us closer to home. And one thing that made MLK unusual was his reliance on logic. When he came face to face with the reality of Vietnam, he recognized and spoke up about it as a driving issue inseparable from the health and prosperity of the people and ideals he represented. He looked at economic justice as inseparable from racial rights.

And as Bob Somerby keeps reflecting on in tribute to MLK's Stride Towards Freedom, he was insightfully simple and inclusive:

Everybody can be great. Because everybody can serve.

You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don't have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don't have to know Einstein's theory of relativity to serve. You don't have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve.

You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

All in all, MLK was inclusive and a conformist - he conformed himself to reality, to his surroundings, to his principles. He didn't surrender to external events, but he didn't drive on by or try to make them simply conform to him. If a neighbor hated him, he didn't blame the neighbor for his hate - he tried to understand the root of the neighbor's hate, the historical underpinnings, the fear or anger or misunderstandings, to work through it, to get beyond it. He conformed as much as possible to their independence, their rights as well.

But we shouldn't become too preoccupied with the famous traitors & conformists - as Bowie noted, we too can be Heroes ("Ich bin auch ein Berliner" in fremde Sprache). Millions of people have dropped off the map trying to change things, push forward a better way, comply with an ideal.

Still, all of the mess we see around us, with Trump and the Tea Party and the corporatization of America and the continuing struggle for survival in the land of plenty is, believe it or not, largely our fault. We can't keep thinking in terms of enemies without stoking up our enemies. We've built up Trump by reacting to him, ogling him, pooling our outrage and invectives, rather than understanding the real reasons why he's popular and how that reflects on our efforts, our communication, how we've dropped the ball. We enjoy the fight more than getting things done, and that's largely the distraction they thrive on. They thrive on us vs. them, and while I'm not a fan of grand bargains, I am a fan of understanding - mutual or otherwise.

I'm sure MLK was called a traitor by both his opponents and supporters for breaking the rules or not being vehement and violent enough in the resistance. But instead of resistance, he focused on insistence, steady conformity, an undeniable belonging, betraying the myopic pettiness and angry attitudes of his time. If only we can keep his sense of reality, of time-and-place and proper action, of the thought that precedes the act. A great man with an impressive legacy, both in terms of results and enduring philosophy.

[PS -Thanks to Jolly for the inspiration. Post on Mexicans to follow.]