Shaun King

Modern-day activists are crucial to the contemporary civil rights movement that is sweeping both the United States and the entire world. The man who has caught my attention, as someone who aspires to cause positive change in a world where, quite often, it seems as though there isn’t any hope, is Shaun King.

To have the emotional strength, compassion, and motivation to work around the clock is something I will always admire. Shaun King is a loving, committed husband and father to four children. Unfortunately, his job brings an incredible amount of perils that force him to put his family at risk — not voluntarily, but his status as a national civil rights activist brings positive attention, with negative attention from people who oppose his work. His life, along with his family’s, has repeatedly been threatened by people who hate the anti-discriminatory messages he works tirelessly to send everyday.

Shaun King, along with his friend Ben Dixon, have decided to reignite a newspaper named The North Star, a pivotal paper published 171 years ago by Frederick Douglass. 171 years ago, The North Star was one of the most influential abolitionist newspapers, started by Mr. Douglass, a freedman, who wrote “It is evident that we must be our own representatives and advocates, not exclusively, but peculiarly, – not distinct from, but in connection with – our white friends.” 171 years later, Shaun King and Ben Dixon plan on tackling a broad range of social issues our society and government failed to remedy. King said it is “necessary for where we’re going and where we are as a country on issues of voting rights, police brutality, mass incarceration,” in an interview about the revival of the iconic newspaper. I couldn’t agree more.

Shaun King is one of the most influential people of 2018, and I can’t adequately express how much I admire, respect, and applaud his indomitable spirit, and what he has done to speak for what is right.