Last Friday, April 4, 2025, marked 57 years since America was blessed with the living presence of Rev Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In his famous Letter from Birmingham Jail Martin Luther King Jr. taught us about life’s interconnectivity when he proclaimed “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”. The unjust and insane Tesla violence America is currently experiencing vindicates Dr. King’s wisdom, it proves that sanctioned violence anywhere is a threat to nonviolence everywhere.
On January 6, 2021, Americans who wrongly believed that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump, rightfully exercised their American citizenship rite to gather, with other like-minded American citizens, at a Save America mass rally outside of the White House to protest the 2020 election results. Excluding the language used by many of the speakers at the rally and the language printed on many of the signs displayed by protestors at the rally, the act of citizens gathering together in mass to express their rejection of the election results, even though their rejection of the election results was without proof or merit, was in the grand tradition of Kingian nonviolent protesting and an exercise of their American constitutional rights of protest and freedom of speech.
Although the protestors gathering together in mass was in the Kingian nonviolent protesting tradition that’s where the similarity ended, unfortunately, Kingian nonviolent protesting rules prohibiting hate or violent speech by rally speakers or on printed protest signs were not adhered to. After hearing many rally speakers profess hate and violent speech and after the keynote speaker, then-President Donald Trump, proclaimed “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore”, over 2000 protestors walked to the Capitol with sanctioned violence in their minds, to prevent a joint session of Congress from counting the Electoral College votes to formalize the victory of then-president-elect Joe Biden.
In the end, 1500 of the protestors-turned-rioters were convicted of federal crimes, the Justice Department documented assaults on over 140 police officers, over 2 million dollars worth of property damage was done to the Capitol by the rioters, and approximately 170 rioters were accused of using deadly or dangerous weapons against law enforcement officers, including fire extinguishers and bear spray. The fact that these protestors-turned-rioters became convicted felons as a result of their violent actions, sent a strong message to everyone that their violence, regardless of the reason, was not only frowned upon but would be punishable by law. Regrettably, that strong anti-violence message was obliterated and transformed into a strong pro-violence message by 2 significant events.
The first significant event to obliterate the strong anti-violence message occurred last November when America, by majority popular vote, elected the person impeached by Congress for inciting the January 6th violence and who made a campaign pledge to pardon all violent Jan. 6 rioters, Donald Trump, President. The second and most significant event that obliterated the anti-violence message was President Trump, as he promised, issuing a blanket pardon to all violent Jan. 6 rioters on his first day as President. President Trump’s election and his issuing pardons to all Jan. 6 rioters, transformed the anti-violence message into a message that violence committed for a political cause is sanctioned and rewarded.
Unfortunately for Elon Musk the message condoning and rewarding Jan. 6 violence is now impacting him. All across America Tesla dealerships and cars have been fire-bombed, by people who feel the federal government they know is being stolen from them by Musk. Instead of showing up at Tesla dealerships as nonviolent protestors, as many have, some people are choosing to follow the example of the Jan 6 rioters and show up as violent rioters that fire-bomb cars and dealership facilities, under the theory that if Jan. 6 rioters committed violence because they felt their government election was stolen from them and were rewarded, then we can be rioters who fire-bomb Teslas because we feel the government we know is being stolen from us and be pardoned by the next Democrat President.
Dr. King taught us that no achievement or no victory can ever justify any violent tactic or any violent road taken to gain the achievement or victory, because as he would say “violence begets violence”. Musk, one who would not even acknowledge Jan. 6 as a violent insurrection, is now a victim of Jan. 6 violence begetting the violent fire-bombing of his cars and dealerships. Hopefully, now that the Jan. 6 sanctioned violence has begotten unsanctioned violence to Musk’s cars and dealerships, begotten unsanctioned violence that President Trump recently declared as domestic terrorism, both Musk and President Trump will learn and live by Dr. King’s wisdom that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”, or specifically in their case sanctioned violence anywhere is a threat to Tesla nonviolence everywhere!!!
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