CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT AND MALCOLM

“I’m not going to turn the other cheek when that person is punching me in the face”. This statement can sum up Malcolm’s approach with in the civil rights movement. After converting to the Nation of Islam faith, Malcolm became a devote believer. He was a very devote, passionate, intense, committed man and he gave 100% total commitment to his beliefs. Malcolm was devoted to be a follower of Elijah Muhammad, the head of the Nation of Islam at the time. At one point, Malcolm said these words to group of followers: “I have sat at our Messenger’s feet, hearing the truth from his own mouth! I have pledged on my knees to Allah to tell the white man about his crimes and the black man the true teachings of our Honorable Elijah Muhammad. I don’t care if it costs my life…”. The Nation of Islam and following Elijah Muhammad became the heart and soul of Malcolm. Malcolm, at one point, even said, “When I was a Christian, I was a thief”.

Soon after leaving the prison, Malcolm changed his name from Malcolm Little to Malcolm X. Malcolm felt that as long as you had you’re given slave name (in this case, Little) you were still under the slave owners power. So the “X” stood for a complete separation from the “white devil”.

In 1953, Elijah asked Malcolm to start a temple in Boston. This temple experienced great growth and he was moved to the head temple in New York City. Great growth was experienced during these years as Malcolm helped the nation of Islam grow from a group of about 400 believers to thousands.

Many people looked at Malcolm as the “John Wayne of blacks”. His message was one of black separatists but also one of self-defense. This is different from protestors (followers of Martin Luther King) but yet different then groups like the Black Panthers. Malcolm was about having a powerful voice and effect but protecting oneself from the evil. Malcolm was completely against the protestor’s methods. He felt that violence requires training and planning and it was important not to destroy oneself to get even. Malcolm had a belief in non-violence but adapted these ideals because he felt this method would work better. Much of the language heard from Malcolm and his teaching was a “bullet for a bullet”, “fight fire with fire”, and “hate for hate”. In this way of thinking, whites were considered to be evil and that blacks were of the divine. Whites were called “the white devils”.

At the age of 34, he was becoming a bigger figure then the Nation of Islam. He was appointed to be an ambassador to Africa. Malcolm’s thinking was to link the Negros with the communities in Africa and become a world majority instead of a small minority in the United States. He had a great understanding of media politics. He knew how to make a sound byte before people knew what a sound byte was. Malcolm became the national minister of the Nation of Islam. The government saw him as a dangerous extremist.

One of the most famous and controversial thoughts of Malcolm was when it came to the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Malcolm said that his assassination was the whites getting repaid for the climate of violence in the United States. “I said that the hate in white men had not stopped with the killing of defenseless black people, but that hate, allowed to spread unchecked, finally had struck down this country’s Chief of State.” This became a very controversial statement and one that would get him suspended from the Nation of Islam.

After this he decided to travel to Mecca and make his Islamic belief pilgrimage. Upon doing this, he saw all colors of people worshipping in peace, harmony, and brotherhood. He began to learn about what he called the real Islam. He saw that narrow-minded thinking was what was damaging blacks, whites, and all. The experience in Mecca was a life-changing event for Malcolm. “I could see from this, that perhaps if white Americans could accept the Oneness of God, then perhaps, too, they could accept the reality the Oneness of Man- and cease to measure and hinder and harm others in term of their ‘differences’ in color.” He changed his beliefs to fit the facts he experienced. Malcolm spent the rest of his life trying to fix the problems that he saw and in some cases the problems that he helped spread. His mission became to build an all-black organization that would help create a society where there would be honest white-black “brotherhood”. He tried to reorganize and work together with other civil rights leaders until his murder at the age of 39.

CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT AND MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

Soon after moving to Montgomery, King was asked to be the keynote speaker at the first boycott meeting. King was the new image of a pastor and quickly was asked to head up the civil rights movement in the city. He was reluctant to do it but everyone wanted him to lead. So he did and he became the new voice of the movement. This voice was one that said, “we must love”. King felt that he was to carry the gospel of freedom. At the first meeting, King preached about the only weapon had been that of protest. He also preached and talked about coming out of captivity. This imagery is one that he would continue to come back to all throughout his life. He used the captive and Exodus into the promise land imagery all throughout his speeches and thinking. King was an outstanding communicator that would make you feel what he was talking about. He was dedicated to the cause of non-violent resistance. To King, this was the only way for the injustice to stop. King felt that non-violent resistance brought about a showing of even more passion then that of a violent person. In non-violent resistance, a person’s “mind and emotions are always active, constantly seeking to persuade the opponent that he is mistaken.” Non-violent resistance was to gain friendship and understanding with the person you are in contact with. All of the boycotts and meetings were “means to awaken a sense of moral shame in the opponent.” King believed the battle was against the forces of evil not individuals. However, in this way of thinking, there needed to be a willingness to suffer. King thought that if one suffered it would lead to the opponent to change their way of thinking. King also thought that non-violent resistance would bring about God’s will being done. Again, King thought the greatest weapon but also the greatest thing a human could have in side themselves is love and not hate.

One of the strongest attributes of King was that he could turn his ideals into action. He felt that taking leadership would mean that he would be killed. Everyman, should have something he’d die for. A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.” At one point, his house was bombed and his response to the people was that there was a need to find the more excellent way. King became the “new Negro” which was one with dignity, self-respect and a lack of fear. He had his followers go into workshops and training on non-violence. In these workshops they would work on developing the answer to these questions: “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating? Are you able to endure the ordeals of jails?”

The method of having rallies and protests were to fill the jails and once they were filled, the people would have to meet the needs being protested. For the most part, this worked until Albany, Georgia where they had the mindset of being non-brutal in tactics with dealing with the protests. King learned to pinpoint his “attacks” better from that experience.