King linked exclusion-from-neighborhood logics to genocidal denial of black existence

Evidence

Just two months after struggling to get out of bed in Grenada, he offered this analysis at an SCLC retreat in St. Helens, South Carolina: “The fact is that the ultimate logic of racism is genocide. If you say that I am not good enough to live next door to you…because of the color of my skin or my ethnic origins, then you are saying in substance that I do not deserve to exist.” Uprooting racial habits along with his criticisms of capitalism and the war in Vietnam set the terms of his challenge to the staff of SCLC and to the nation. This is the radical King, the mature King. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 271

Categorization

• DEFINE: Provides a concrete anchor for ‘racial habits’ — the notion King had to uproot them, situating them as practices embedded in daily life rather than mere attitudes.
• XREF: connects to: Narratives of black invisibility legitimate land seizures by erasing prior claims — Tavengwa Gwekwerere, Davie E. Mutasa, and Kudakwashe Chitofiri, Settlers, Rhodesians, and Supremacists:…, 57