Reverend William J. Barber II emphasized the importance of mobilizing and standing up to injustices in the face of political polarization and inequality at the University’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Lecture.
Barber is the president and senior lecturer of grassroots organization Repairers of the Breach and co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign, a nonviolent mobilization effort that seeks to learn from and act upon the effects of poverty and inequality. He is also a professor at Yale Divinity School, where he founded the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy.
This year, the event holds greater significance “at a time in our country’s history when efforts are being made to devalue, minimize and erase the contributions of Black people,” said Patricia Poitevien ’94 MD’98, the interim vice president for the Office of Inclusion, Equity and Diversity, at the lecture. The lecture — which was established in 1996 — is organized by the OIED.
In the face of a changing political climate, Poitevien added that the University will continue “uplifting the achievements of our entire community, with a particular focus on amplifying voices of those that have been historically marginalized.”
Throughout the lecture, which was titled “We Are Called to Be a Movement,” Barber told the audience to recognize and acknowledge that the current state of America is flawed.
“Something deep and sinister and ugly is going on,” he said. “It is trying to impact our future, and we must see it now.”
Barber claimed that President Trump’s recent flurry of executive orders was an attempt at “flooding the zone” — a method aiming to use media attention on executive orders to distract U.S. citizens from other federal policy actions.
“Executive orders don’t carry the weight of law,” he said. “They can be overturned by the next administration.”
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
He questioned what he called the myths and distortions that allow poverty and inequality to continue, asking the audience, “What kind of mythology will cause you to vote for somebody that ignores the reality of 140 million poor and low-wealth people in this country today?”
To combat both systemic inequality and political polarization, Barber called for increased collective organizing that transcends racial, ethnic and other demographic divisions.
“We have to come together across all of the lines that tend to separate us,” he said. “This threat to civilization operates off of division.”
Barber also noted how racial divisions and injustice are weaponized by politicians, specifically highlighting the Southern strategy, a tactic employed by the Republican party in the 1960s that sought to use racial division to create campaign advantages among certain voting demographics.
He cited the 1968 election in which the Republican party painted the Democrats as the “Black Party” to encourage more white voters to favor Richard Nixon. He argues that in 2025, a similar strategy is being used to prevent a “challenge of the oligarch hold on the nation … every time there’s a potential for these groups to come together, division is sown.”
Barber stressed the importance of adhering to an “eternal commitment to justice no matter how much injustice we see around us.”
“We always have power,” he said. “We have to have a moral commitment — Brown University — to keep pushing until the sick are healed, until children are saved, until low wage workers are paid, until there’s housing for all.”
The event opened with a performance by Shades of Brown, an acapella group “rooted in African American tradition,” according to the Student Activities website.
Prior to Barber’s appearance on the stage, Yara Allen, director of field musicology and cultural arts with Repairs of the Breach, led the audience in a song, inviting audience members to repeat the lines “It’s going on far too long” and “We won’t be silent anymore.”
For several students, Barber’s lecture prompted them to reflect on their position in the current political climate.
“Why we believe certain myths and why certain myths perpetuate systemic inequities was really interesting,” said Jodi Robinson ’26. “Both in terms of pointing that out, but then also thinking about how we can then resist that.”
Mina Bahadori ’26 found Barber’s call to action inspiring, noting that the public plays a role in shaping politics and the country’s future.
“I think a lot of people are just kind of waiting for a good candidate, but we have to put in the work,” she said.
