You need to know
Lionel Richie almost marched with Martin Luther King Jr., but his parents stopped him.
In an article published on Saturday, October 4th, while discussing his newly released memoir with the Guardian, the “Hello” singer recalled growing up in Tuskegee, Alabama during the civil rights movements of the 50s and 60s.
“What I didn’t realize was that it created the heart of who I was,” said Richie, 76. “At the time, my parents were emphasizing that they would keep a lot of that edge away from us, so I didn’t notice. We were in the bubble.”
In an interview, the “All Night Long” singer said he wanted to take part in the march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965, but his parents spoke to him.
“I wanted to be a part of it,” said Richie, who was 15 at the time. “And my parents kept saying it was dangerous.”
“I was mad because I thought they had left me out of some of my most important history,” he added. “My anger came when I realized what my grandmother and grandfather had gone through and what my mother and father had gone through.”
Eventually, Richie asks her parents why they protected him from it.
“Their answer was, “I didn’t want anything to limit you to your thoughts about what your future potential would be,” he told the outlet. “‘And if we were obsessed with our rage, you’ll be caught up in our rage.”
“You couldn’t miss it,” he continued. “I noticed Tuskegee’s rage, so every day I noticed it.”
Marco Kost/Redferns
Later in the conversation, Richie expresses disappointment that society today is moving “backwards,” but he does not feel that it is a place to participate in political leadership.
“If you’re waiting for Martin Luther Richie, he won’t come,” he said. “But if you’re waiting for Lionel Richie, the bearer of love, you’ve got me.”
“At the time I thought politics was a great place. But I saw Malcolm (x). I saw Martin, I saw all civil rights people, and they didn’t survive it. It won’t survive,” he continued. “Politics is ugly, that’s annoying. And now it’s getting worse because I’m going to re-submit you to the character before you get in. And I’ve found a way for me to work.”
It’s really available by Richie, who documented the lessons he learned in the course of his most unlikely success story.
