Malcolm X had been a pimp, a cocaine addict and a thief. He was an unashamed demagogue. His gospel was hatred: "Your little babies will get polio!" he cried to the "white devils." His creed was violence: "If ballots won't work, bullets will."The first paragraph of that is quoted in "Anniversary of Malcolm X's death offers new chance to put his life in perspective."
Yet even before his bullet-ripped body went to its grave, Malcolm X was being sanctified. Negro leaders called him “brilliant,” said he had recently “moderated” his views, blamed his assassination on “the white power structure” or, in the case of Martin Luther King, on a “society sick enough to express dissent with murder.” Malcolm’s death, they agreed, was a setback to the civil rights movement....
Malcolm’s murder, almost certainly at the hands of the Black Muslims from whom he had defected, came on a bright Sunday afternoon in full view of 400 Negroes in the Audubon Ballroom, a seedy two-story building on Manhattan’s upper Broadway. Characteristically, he had kept his followers waiting for nearly an hour while he lingered over tea and a banana split at a nearby Harlem restaurant.
Entering the auditorium at last, Malcolm cried “As-salaam alaikum [Peace be unto you].” The audience replied in unison: “Wa-alaikum salaam [And unto you be peace].” Suddenly a disturbance broke out several rows back. “Get your hand off my pockets!” a man shouted. “Don’t be messing with my pockets!” At the distraction, Malcolm raised his hands. “Now brothers!” he cried, “Be cool, don’t get excited...."
February 21, 2015
50 years ago today: Malcolm X was shot dead.
As Time Magazine put it:
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42 comments:
"Malcolm’s death, they agreed, was a setback to the civil rights movement...."
Wrong. Malcolm's life was a setback to the civil rights movement.
By the way, who was it that killed Malcolm?
Just another ISIS member who bit the dust.
"50 years ago today: Malcolm X was shot dead."....His creed was violence: "If ballots won't work, bullets will."
And he was right!
I can understand the desire to sanctify MLK. For all his faults, MLK was a martyr for a just cause.
The heirs to Malcolm X are Farrakahn (who incidentally basically admits complicity in the assassination), Jesse and Al.
We should have never mourned his death and made him into something he wasn't. Maybe he was changing. But even so, he didn't do anything to repair the damage he caused.
"The heirs to Malcolm X are Farrakahn (who incidentally basically admits complicity in the assassination), Jesse and Al."
To the contrary...these are the heirs of the man ("the honorable Muhammed") and the organization (the Nation of Islam) Malcolm X rejected and left behind.
All to often left unsaid in the death of Malcolm X is that he died because he became a "standard issue" Sunni Muslim & that involved rejecting the racist fantasies of Elijah Mohammed. As he learned more & more about Islam, he discovered just what a crock what EM was preaching was.
It is amazing how much the media will cover for the incredibly crazed theology (racist & otherwise) of the Nation of Islam (e.g. during the Million Man March). They'll find "Christian Identity" theology under every heartland rock & bush, even when it doesn't exist (e.g. Timothy McVey), but when The Nation or the New Black Panther Party preaches explicit, classical, racism, they're asleep at the switch.
And don't even get me started on the Shabazz family. What sort of psychopath sets his own grandmother on fire?
As he learned more & more about Islam, he discovered just what a crock what EM was preaching was.
I must confess total ignorance on the subject of Malcolm X and his creed, motivated partly by boredom and partly by intellectual budgetary constraints (If I'm going to invest any neurons in the study of the life and deeds of a famous villain I think I'll stick to Reinhard Heydrich, a non-pimp non-addict who spent his non-villainous time being a model parent, an Olympic athlete, and a brilliant musician -- a much more engaging personality, no?)
With my stipulations all stipulated I ask in all sincerity, did Malcolm X ever repudiate in public any of the hatred he so loudly espoused in public?
@Quaestor,
did Malcolm X ever repudiate in public any of the hatred he so loudly espoused in public?
Yes, but the weasel-words here are in public.
To his followers & to the followers of Elijah Mohammed, he made his break & the reasons for his break very clear -- what EM taught was not Islam. How far that message penetrated into the wider public consciousness in the relatively short time between his conversion to Sunni Islam after making the Haj, and his murder, I honestly don't know.
Anniversary of Malcolm X's death offers new chance to put his life in perspective.
That linked Penn Live article stinks of the barnyard. I have no doubt that if Ivey DeJesus penned an essay marking the anniversary of Apollo 11 she'd devote much of it to speculations about moon landing fakery.
That Columbia would budget a salary for a psychopath like Zaheer Ali to operate an intellectual Potemkin village like the "Malcolm X Project" is merely typical.
A new chance to put his life in perspective, eh? How can something one dimensional be put in perspective?
@YoungHegelian,
Yes, but the weasel-words here are in public.
The words are mine. What are you implying?
Of course Malcom Little came to a bad end. He rode to fame by appealing to the aggressively stupid.
Ride the tiger, one of two things usually happen -- when you get off the tiger and the tiger eats you, or you keep riding it and get shot by the bullets of people trying to protect themselves from the tiger.
In Little's case, he apparently tried a dismount, and the tiger got him.
Regardless of the facts, the occasion prompts the "intellectual liberals" in the range of my social media to claim it was all the white establishment's doing as it was for MLK, while nodding their heads in smug approval of their lofty insight.
Goes to show:
1. Black lives matter, except to other blacks.
2. "Peace be unto you" is a signal for Muslims to start shooting.
Steven wrote: [Malcolm X] rode to fame by appealing to the aggressively stupid...
Kudos. The best epitaph the man ever had.
I believe this topic has been well and truly exhausted, Professor.
The original 2nd amendment advocate!!
Malcolm Little condoned violence, but did he ever actually practice it or directly incite it? I know he was in jail for drug related offenses, but was he ever convicted of or charged with a violent crime, or did he ever instigate a riot or act of violence? Or was he all talk?
@Questor,
Yes, but the weasel-words here are in public.
The words are mine. What are you implying?
I'm not implying anything. I'm saying that during his relatively short involvement (12 years) & break with EM, I don't think much of Malcolm X's life was known to the wider American public. Much of his fame is posthumous, and is based on the strength of his autobiography. So, for those few, almost all of them blacks involved in the black Islamic movement, who followed Malcolm X's journey during his life, yes, he did publicly repudiate his earlier calls to violence & racial separatism.
His childhood was hardly idyllic.
He was 39 years old when he died. He lived under the influence and belief system of Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam for almost 20 years. Near the end of his life it appeared he was evolving, abandoning his ‘white devil’ rhetoric and broadening his worldview.
Had he lived to age 70 who knows what his perspective would have been.
On CNN's "Crossfire," Republican John Sununu had asserted that if Malcolm X were alive today, he would be a Republican.
" "Peace be unto you" is a signal for Muslims to start shooting."
Exactly. Good one.
It might have been different.
Malcolm Little excelled in junior high school but dropped out after a white teacher told him that practicing law, his aspiration at the time, was "no realistic goal for a nigger".[15] Later Malcolm X recalled feeling that the white world offered no place for a career-oriented black man, regardless of talent.[15]--Wikipedia
Malcolm X was a brilliant and energetic man. When persons like him are stifled, they seek other outlets. If they are stifled enough, they tend to rebel. Think W.E.B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey, Langston Hughes, Marcus Garvey, Paul Robeson and many others. I have listed some of the most accomplished and interesting of the group. There were others less savory, combining the grifter with the rebel. But the destruction of human potential that racism caused in this country is immense. Malcolm X's potential was not destroyed, but it was radically rechanneled. Not everyone will become A. Phillip Randolph or Martin Luther King, men of patience who overcome the urge to lash out in anger or vengeance. Malcolm X, whatever you think of him, was America's creation.
"If I'm going to invest any neurons in the study of the life and deeds of a famous villain...."
Malcolm X was not a villain.
"Malcolm X was a brilliant and energetic man. When persons like him are stifled, they seek other outlets"
Especially if they are Muslim.
Already a predictable tsunami of nonsense has washed over us about the "root causes" of terrorism. We have heard from Obama administration officials and even the President himself that terrorism has something to do with lack of opportunities and poverty. Obama said on Wednesday that "we have to address grievances terrorists exploit, including economic grievances."
He said, "when millions of people -- especially youth -- are impoverished and have no hope for the future, when corruption inflicts daily humiliations on people, when there are no outlets by which people can express their concerns, resentments fester. The risk of instability and extremism grow. Where young people have no education, they are more vulnerable to conspiracy theories and radical ideas..."
The President did acknowledge that terrorists can be rich like Osama bin Laden, who was the son of a Saudi construction magnate who attended the top high school and the best university in Saudi Arabia. It's hard to imagine someone with more opportunities. Think the Trump family Saudi-style, minus the bling, and throw in a deep admiration for the Taliban."
Yes. The Muslim part is the problem.
I read The Autobiography. It's a good book, but I can't help but feel that the Malcolm X presented in the book was to some extent a literary creation of Alex Healey. In Malcolm's other written words, he doesn't come across so poised and balanced.......In the autobiography, Malcolm admits to lying on occasion. That comment by the teacher sounds like a lie.......It's possible that Malcolm was attracted to the Sunni faith because it offered a more reasoned and intelligent repudiation of western (i.e. white) culture than Elijah 's simplicities. I don't think Malcolm was all that reconciled with America.
"Steven wrote: ['Malcolm X] rode to fame by appealing to the aggressively stupid...'
"Kudos. The best epitaph the man ever had."
Said, and kudoed, by two who mark themselves as being among those they imagine Malcolm X appealed to.
"Malcolm X was not a villain."
No, just another Muslim. Unlike Clarence Thomas, for example. Or Fredrick Douglass, or even Charles Payne who I used to listen to on the radio and never suspected he was black until I a saw him on Glenn Beck's TV show.,
The more things change, the more they stay the same:
Malcom X didn't "love his country".
Negro leaders called him “brilliant,” said he had recently “moderated” his views, blamed his assassination on “the white power structure” ... Malcolm’s murder, almost certainly at the hands of the Black Muslims from whom he had defected, came on a bright Sunday afternoon in full view of 400 Negroes...
Can't say Muslim extremists!
Characteristically, he had kept his followers waiting for nearly an hour while he lingered over tea and a banana split at a nearby Harlem restaurant.
Why can I just eat my waffle?
malcolm offered the easy road, the road that required nothing. Most took it. As we see.
Barrack Hussein had been a pussy, a cocaine addict and a community organizer. He was an unashamed demagogue. His gospel was hatred: "Your little babies will get measles!" he cried to the "white devils." His creed was violence: "If they bring a knife, we bring a gun... Get up in their faces!"
Fixed It For You...
He didn't really moderate his views all that much. He was just taken down a peg because he had a falling out with the nation of Islam.
The sop that he went to mecca and realized that muslims came in all colors was not really a capitulation on his racial views. Rather it was a way for his fans to scrub his image so he didn't come across like Louis Farrakhan.
See, he started coming around at the end!
Not really> ANd he was done in by his own people. As he was fond of saying, the chickens came home to roost.
lemondog wrote:
He was 39 years old when he died. He lived under the influence and belief system of Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam for almost 20 years. Near the end of his life it appeared he was evolving, abandoning his ‘white devil’ rhetoric and broadening his worldview.
It's easy to say that since he never actually did. But imagine if he didn't have that conversion and was that crank from the 60's talking about white devils.
Since we're supposed to be about inclusion these days his brand of extremism would be like the people that want to secede from the country.
Hence, he needed to have his image white washed and made whole. And having the author moderate his views after the fact does that.
But this white devil thinks he was one of the most divicise people in the 60's.
And it took him to middle age before he didn't get the concept that all whites are not devils? He was a bomb thrower that got in league with untrustworthy people. And they shot him for it.
Along the way he said some interesting things in a militant way that appeals to militants. By any means necessary!
Robert Cook wrote: Malcolm X was not a villain.
Consider the source.
QED.
Malcolm supposedly had his conversion in 1964 (and was killed in 1965) He went to Mecca in May and supposedly had his conversion.
He came back and in June of 1965 founded the Organizatoin of African American Unity:
"The OAAU pushed for black control of every aspect of the black community. At the founding rally, Malcolm X stated that the organization's principal concern was the human rights of blacks, but that it would also focus on voter registration, school boycotts, rent strikes, housing rehabilitation, and social programs for addicts, unwed mothers, and troubled children. Malcolm X saw the OAAU as a way of "un-brainwashing" black people, ridding them of the lies they had been told about themselves and their culture.
On July 17, 1964, Malcolm X was welcomed to the second meeting of the Organization of African Unity in Cairo as a representative of the OAAU.[3]
When a reporter asked whether white people could join the OAAU, Malcolm X said, "Definitely not." Then he added, "If John Brown were still alive, we might accept him."
he also said at the time: Now, if white people want to help, they can help. But they can't join. They can help in the white community, but they can't join. We accept their help. They can form the White Friends of the Organization of Afro-American Unity and work in the white community on white people and change their attitude toward us. They don't ever need to come among us and change our attitude. We've had enough of them working around us trying to change our attitude. That's what got us all messed up. So we don't question their sincerity, we don't question their motives, we don't question their integrity. We just encourage them to use it somewhere else in the white community. If they can use all of this sincerity in the white community to make the white community act better toward us, then we'll say, "Those are good white folks." But they don't have to come around us, smiling at us and showing us all their teeth like white Uncle Toms, to try and make themselves acceptable to us. The White Friends of the Organization of Afro American Unity, let them work in the white community."
say that reminds me an awful lot of the people running the Hands up, don't shoot signs. When whitey came to ask to help they had all these rules about how whites could help by not speaking. Not much has changed with those pushing the don't sell out mantra that people like crack espoused.
On one hand I get where he's coming from. All these obnoxious left wingers would always be hanging around the black panthers pretending to be down with the struggle. But even the blacks knew they were a bunch of phonies and wanted little to do with such cretinous people.
However, speaking for myself, if I was told that I could help but I couldn't come into the community and show my white teeth like an uncle tom, I'd tell him and his racist ass what he could do with my support. If my money were to go to supporting black causes it certainly wouldn't be to one that would refer to me as a a good white folk who can't set foot in the black community but has to give and give just to prove how good I am as a white.
Same old racialism from Malcolm, all the way to the end.
Given what had been and was going on, surely one can understand his perspective even without being in agreement.
Think John Brown.
Over forty years ago a young black man about my age, dressed like an IBM salesman in a spotless white shirt, dark tie, and shiny black shoes, approached me on the street in downtown Louisville to solicit a charitable contribution for the construction of a children's hospital. If he had stopped with that I would have offered him five bucks and probably forgotten the encounter.
He had much else that he wanted to share with me, though. He spoke very politely as he identified his self as a follower of Elijah Muhammad and detailed some of his beliefs. The children's hospital, he said, would admit only black children who would be cared for by an all black staff. This was because, he said, white people like me were devils and lacked souls. We were unclean and not true humans like black people, but derived from demons and not to be trusted.
His matter of fact, polite demeanor presented a startling contrast with his message of hate which he shared at the same time as he asked for my contribution to his superficially benign cause. I was so intrigued that I listened until he seemed to have exhausted his white devil routine and then asked him whether he didn't perceive some internal tension in his position - asking a white person for money and explaining at the same time that I was not human because I was white.
He thought about it and said that I couldn't be expected to understand. Because I was white. I should have let it go but I asked him further whether such a detailed explanation of his faith wasn't wasted on an inhuman devil who could not be expected to understand a word of it. Wasn't this, I pointed out, something like sharing his thoughts with a stone? He agreed. I was as soulless and implacable as a stone. And could he please have a contribution now.
I was impressed. He had been at it for half an hour. I gave him a buck.
Outstanding.
www.bspn24.com
Robert Cook: "Malcolm X was not a villain."
Cookie Axiom: No villains on the Left!
Years ago I read Bruce Perry's book Malcolm: The Life of a Man Who Changed Black America. From Amazon:
This fascinating psychological portrait, strikingly different from the one given in the Autobiography, is of a man who was abused by both his parents, who never shook off the conflicts of his troubled youth, and whose internalized messages of racial ambivalence continued to plague him throughout his brilliant career. ...
Exhaustively researched, this first comprehensive biography of Malcolm X is based on the oral and written accounts of over 400 people who knew him, as well as government files and Malcolm's letters.
Then there is Tom Lehrer's introduction to National Brotherhood Week.:
One week of every year is designated National Brotherhood Week. This is just one of many such weeks honoring various worthy causes. One of my favorites is National Make-fun-of-the-handicapped Week which Frank Fontaine and Jerry Lewis are in charge of as you know. During National Brotherhood Week various special events are arranged to drive home the message of brotherhood. This year, for example, on the first day of the week Malcolm X was killed which gives you an idea of how effective the whole thing is. I'm sure we all agree that we ought to love one another and I know there are people in the world that do not love their fellow human beings and I hate people like that. Here's a song about National Brotherhood Week.
"Robert Cook: 'Malcolm X was not a villain.'"
"Cookie Axiom: No villains on the Left!"
You're assuming Malcolm X was on the left. I don't know that his politics could be neatly summarized so. Or do you you think that all those who stand up for themselves and their people against oppression and abuse by the larger society are "leftists?" I suppose that can be so, depending on how one defines "left," but...is standing up for liberation from oppression a bad thing?
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