The Bloody Shirt Tactic - and Charlie Kirk
Like the "Bloody Shirt Tactic" that helped launch the career of Jesse Jackson after Martin Luther King Jr.'s death, people are now using Kirk's tragic death to take over leadership of the movement he founded.
On Wednesday morning, a tweet went viral that got people talking about something called the "Bloody Shirt Tactic." The person who posted it, Fred Aaron, was warning about what he sees happening after Charlie Kirk's assassination last week.
Aaron's tweet basically said that when famous people die, opportunists often swoop in and try to take over their legacy. He called these people "grifters and charlatans" and said we're seeing this happen right now with Charlie Kirk's death. But Aaron traced this whole idea back to 1968, when Martin Luther King Jr. was killed.
What Happened in Memphis
On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. Jesse Jackson, who was a young activist at the time, was in the courtyard below when it happened.
After King died, Jackson told a very specific story about what happened. He said King died in his arms and that his clothes were soaked in King's blood. The next morning, he went on a Chicago TV show wearing what he said was the same blood-stained turtleneck shirt he'd been wearing when King was shot.
This story helped make Jackson famous overnight. It made him seem like King's closest companion in those final moments, which gave him credibility to speak for the civil rights movement going forward.
The problem was, other people who were there told a different story. Ralph David Abernathy, who was supposed to be King's successor, said he was actually the one who held King as he died. King's driver and other witnesses backed up Abernathy's version.
The controversy followed Jackson for years. In 1988, when Jackson was running for president, New York Mayor Ed Koch flat-out called him a liar because of these conflicting stories about King's death.
But despite the disputes, Jackson's dramatic account of being there, covered in King's blood, helped launch him into national prominence. He started his own organizations, Operation PUSH and later Operation Rainbow PUSH, and became one of the most recognizable civil rights leaders in America. He even ran for president twice.
Aaron's tweet criticized Jackson's leadership over the decades, saying he had "few tangible accomplishments" and that he turned the civil rights movement into something more focused on Democratic Party politics than grassroots activism.
Fast Forward to Charlie Kirk
Charlie Kirk, who founded the conservative group Turning Point USA, was shot and killed on September 10 at Utah Valley University in Utah. He was 31 years old.
Kirk's death has caused a lot of strong reactions. Some people have held vigils for him, while others have actually celebrated his death online. At some Texas universities, people disrupted memorial services, which led to students getting expelled.
Aaron's tweet suggested that the same thing that happened after King's death is happening now with Kirk. He didn't name names, but he implied that people are trying to position themselves as the true inheritors of Kirk's conservative movement and his fight against what he called "woke" ideology.
People on social media have been echoing Aaron's concerns, with one person replying to his tweet: "Spot on. The vultures are circling."
The whole idea behind the "Bloody Shirt Tactic" goes back to old political tactics where politicians would literally wave bloody clothing around to get people emotional and fired up. In modern times, it's about how some people use tragic deaths to boost their own careers or agendas.
Aaron's warning seems to be that in the chaos after Kirk's death, with Turning Point USA's future uncertain and the conservative movement mourning a prominent figure, some people might try to exploit the situation for their own benefit rather than genuinely continuing Kirk's work.
Jesse Jackson, who is now 83 and has Parkinson's disease, hasn't responded to Aaron's tweet. In 2018, he said King's death "redefined" the civil rights movement and maintained that he was close to the events that night, though he didn't directly address the disputed claims about the blood.
The debate shows how when influential people die, especially in politics, there are often fights over who gets to carry on their legacy and whether those people are doing it for the right reasons.