The Autobiography of Malcolm X

“A wise man can play the part of a clown, but a clown can’t play the part of a wise man.”

| Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“We come out because our scope is broad, our scope is international rather than national, and our interests are international, rather than national. Our interests are world-wide, rather than limited just to things American, or things New York, or things Mississippi. And this is very important. You can get into a conversation with a person, and in five minutes tell whether or not that person’s scope is broad or whether that person’s scope is narrow, whether that person is interested in things going on in his block where he lives or interested in things going on all over the world. Now persons who are narrow-minded, because their knowledge is limited, think that they’re affected only by things happening in their block. But when you find a person who has a knowledge of things of the world today, he realizes that what happens in South Vietnam can affect him if he’s living on St. Nicholas Avenue, or what’s happening in the Congo affected his situation on 8th Avenue or 7th Avenue or Lenox Avenue. The person who realizes the effect that things all over the world have right on his block, on his salary, on his reception or lack of reception into society, immediately becomes interested in things international. But if a person’s scope is so limited that he thinks things that affect him are only those things that take place across the street or downtown, then he’s only interested in things across the street and downtown. So, one of our greatest desires here at Organization of Afro-American Unity meetings is to try and broaden the scope and even the reading habits of most of our people, who need their scope broadened and their reading habits also broadened today.”

| Malcolm X (January 24th, 1964)

(Source: blunthought)

“I don’t go along with anyone who wants to teach our people nonviolence until someone is at the same time teaching our enemy to be nonviolent.”

| Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“White America, wake up and take heed, before it is too late!”

— Malcolm X (Dec. 4, 1963)

(Source: blunthought)

“(Malcolm X) was our pathway to revolutionary understanding. Malcolm X went through a series of rites of passage - from Malcolm Little to Detroit Red to Satan to Malcolm X to El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. All this because the man never stopped trying to develop and recognize the best of himself. He was self-determined. Malcolm was saying we need to be more. And we heard that. And he said it better than anybody ever said it. He made it clear to us. So all we wanted to do was to be disciples of Malcolm, in a sense, using poetry to illuminate the same values that he planted in our head.” 

| Abiodun Oyewole

On Malcolm X’s influence on the Last Poets (2001).

(Source: blunthought)

“It’s good to keep wide-open ears and listen to what everybody else has to say, but when you come to make a decision, you have to weigh all of what you”ve heard on its own, and place it where it belongs, and come to a decision for yourself; you”ll never regret it. But if you form the habit of taking what someone else says about a thing without checking it out for yourself, you”ll find that other people will have you hating your friends and loving your enemies.”

| Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“Another example at the international level of how skillfully they use this trickery was in the Congo. In the Congo, airplanes were dropping bombs on African villages. African villages don’t have a defense against bombs. And the pilot can’t tell who the bomb is being dropped upon. When a bomb hits a village, everything goes. And these pilots, flying planes filled with bombs, dropping these bombs on African villages, were destroying women, were destroying children, were destroying babies. You never heard any outcry over here about that.

And it had started way back in June. They would drop bombs on African villages that would blow that village apart and everything in it — man, woman, child, and baby. No outcry, no sympathy, no support, no concern, because the press didn’t project it in such a way that it would be designed to get your sympathy. They know how to put something so that you’ll sympathize with it, and they know how to put it so you’ll be against it. I’m telling you, they are masters at it. And if you don’t develop the analytical ability to read between the lines in what they’re saying, I’m telling you again — they’ll be building gas ovens, and before you wake up you’ll be in one of them, just like the Jews ended up in gas ovens over there in Germany. You’re in a society that’s just as capable of building gas ovens for Black people as Hitler’s society was.

This was mass murder in the Congo, of women and children and babies. But there was no outcry even from the white liberals, even from your “friends.” Why? Because they made it appear that it was a humanitarian project. They said that the planes were being flown by “American-trained anti-Castro Cuban pilots.” This is propaganda, too. Soon as you hear that it’s American-trained, you say, “Oh that’s all right, that’s us.” And the anti-Castro Cubans, “Oh that’s all right too, ‘cause if they’re against Castro, whoever else they’re against that’s good, ‘cause Castro is a monster.” But you see how step-by-step they grab your mind?

And these pilots are hired, their salaries are paid by the United States government. They’re called mercenaries, these pilots are. And a mercenary is not someone who kills you because he’s patriotic. He kills you for blood money, he’s a hired killer. This is what a mercenary means. And they’re able to take these hired killers, put them in American planes, with American bombs, and drop them on African villages, blowing to bits Black men, Black women, Black children, Black babies, and you Black people sitting over here cool like it doesn’t even involve you. You’re a fool. They’ll do it to them today, and do it to you tomorrow. Because you and I and they are all the same.

They call it a humanitarian project and that they’re doing it in the name of freedom. And all of this, these glorious terms, are used to pave the way in your mind for what they’re going to do.

Then they take Tshombe. You’ve heard of Tshombe. He’s the worst African that was ever born. The lowest type that was ever born. He’s a murderer himself. He’s the murderer of Lumumba, the former prime minister of — the first and only rightful prime minister of the Congo. He’s an international — he’s a murderer with an international stature as a murderer. Yet the United States government went and got Tshombe in Spain, and put him as the head of the Congolese government. This is criminal! Here’s a man who’s a murderer, so the United States takes him, puts him over the Congo, and supports his government with your tax dollars. Now — they hired him to occupy the position as head of state over the Congo — a killer! He is a hired killer himself! His salary’s paid by the United States government. And he turns — his first move is to bring in South Africans, who hate everything in sight. He hires those South Africans to come and kill his own Congolese people. And the United States, again, pays their salary.

You know, it’s something to think about. How do you think you would feel right now if some Congolese brothers walked up to you — and they look just like you, don’t think you don’t look Congolese. You look as much Congolese as a Congolese does. They got all kinds of Congolese over there. How would you feel if one of them walked up to you and asked you about what your government is doing in the Congo. I was asked that when I was over there. But they don’t have to come to me like that, ‘cause they know where I stand automatically. And for one time I’m thankful to the press, for letting everybody know where I stand. They — but you have no explanation. Your tongue stays in your mouth. And then you have to become — you have to go to the extreme to convince them that you don’t go along with what the United States government is doing in the Congo.

And they justify the usage of Tshombe as the present head of state by saying that he’s the only African who can unite — or bring unity to the Congo. Has he brought unity to the Congo? But, see, this is their game! And their real reason for wanting Tshombe there was so that Tshombe could invite them to come in. Now, what African head of state would have dared to invite outside powers? So they put Tshombe there, and as soon as Tshombe got there he invited them to bring paratroopers from Belgium in the United States’ transport planes to try and recapture Congo.

This is all a cold-blooded act on the part of your Western powers, namely the Western powers here in the United States — interests in the United States, in England, and France, and Belgium and so forth. They want the wealth of the Congo, plus its strategic geographic position.

The step-by-step process that was used by the press: First they fanned the flame in such a manner to create hysteria in the mind of the public. And then they shift gears and fan the flame in a manner designed to get the sympathy of the public. And once they go from hysteria to sympathy, their next step is to get the public to support them in whatever act they’re getting ready to go down with. You’re dealing with a cold calculating international machine, that’s so criminal in its objectives and motives that it has the seeds of its own destruction, right within. They use the press to emphasize that white hostages are being held by [inaudible] — imagine that — or white priests, white missionaries, white nuns — they don’t say nuns: white nuns. You know what the paper said right here in Detroit: white missionaries, not just a missionary; a white nun — as if there’s a difference between a white nun and a black nun; or a white priest and a black priest; or if the light that’s in a white skin is more valuable than a light within a black skin. This is what they’re implying! And the press — look at the press when this thing was going on — and you will see what I’m talking about. They’re vicious in their whiteness.

But still, I wouldn’t judge them just ‘cause they’re white, or they’d call me a racist. [I’m] judging by their deeds, by their conscious behavior — and you know how they’ve been consciously behaving in the Congo, and how they consciously behave in Vietnam, and how they consciously behave right now in Alabama and Mississippi. So you and I got to get conscious, and start behaving in a way that we can offset this thing before it’s too late — and this is what they don’t want to hear.”

| Malcolm X (February 14th, 1965 in Detroit)

(Source: blunthought)

“In my opinion, the young generation of whites, blacks, browns, whatever else there is, you’re living at a time of extremism, a time of revolution, a time when there has got to be a change. People in power have misused it, and now there has to be change and a better world has to be built, and the only way it is going to built is with extreme methods. And I for one, will join in with anyone, I don’t care what color you are, as long as you want to change this miserable condition that exists on this earth. Thank you.”

— Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“What I want to know is how the white man, with the blood of black people dripping off his fingers, can have the audacity to be asking black people why they hate him?”

— Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“The white man is afraid of truth… I’m the only black man they’ve ever been close to who they know speaks the truth to them. Its their guilt that upsets them, not me.”

— Malcolm X

(Source: blunthought)

“You can’t have capitalism without racism.”

| Malcolm X

     ”I watched Malcolm’s face as he stood, again and again trying in his humble and somewhat awkward way to acknowledge his thanks to those who had approved of his message. The heat which the Great Hall generated had already begun to take effect on all of us. Malcolm’s face was covered with perspiration, but it mixed well with the tears in his eyes and the smile on his face. I had seen Brother Malcolm’s face before in America, many times and in many audiences. I had seen crowds cheer him, extol him and shout to him as their deliverer. I had seen his faces and many moods; his happy moments in Harlem and Chicago; and I had seen his face filled with depression and outrage because another black brother had sold out or, worse yet, refused to “fight” because he believed that could appeal to the conscience of white America and overcome its racism.

     But there was something in his face that evening which I had never seen before. At first glance I thought it was his small beard that made the difference, for I had never seen him with one before. He had always had that clean-cut Muslim look, and somehow the beard didn’t fit that image. But the second glance—a deeper look—was more revealing. Malcolm’s face was new because it was filled with the youth and excitement of those black students who identified with him. And he was awkward too, like a father who loves his newly-born son but hasn’t quite discovered the correct way to pick up and hold the child; the result is that he becomes debilitated by his own happiness and forgets about his own ineptitude. And what a proud father he could be! Unlike his children of African descent in America, these children would grow up, nay, develop, in a free society. They would be black and beautiful; most would be brave and all would be free. They would create their own standard of beauty and excellence; create their own history and worship their own memories. And one day they would be men and women; have power and greatness, which, as Nkrumah said, “is indestructible because it is built not on fear, envy and suspicion; nor won at the expense of others but founded on hope, trust, friendship, and directed to the good of all mankind.”

| Leslie Alexander Lacy (Essay on Malcolm X)

“Brother, you think your life is so

sweet that you would live at any price?

Does mere existence balance with the

weight of your great sacrifice?

Or can it be you fear the grave enough

to live and die a slave?

Oh brother! Let it be said that when

you’re dead

And tears are shed that your life was

a stepping stone, which your children

crossed upon;

Look each foeman in the eye—

Lest you die in vain” 

| Malcolm X ( the Great Hall at the University of Ghana-Legon, Tuesday, May 12, 1964)