A change is gonna come
February 21, 2025 3:40 AM Subscribe
60 years a martyr: on this day in 1965 CE, Malcolm X was shot by assassins. On February 21, 1965, two men shot El Hajj Malik El Shabbaz (Malcolm X) in New York City.
Many people come to know of Malcolm X via his indelible Autobiography, on which he collaborated with writer Alex Haley (who went on to worldwide fame for his groundbreaking book about the African diaspora and slavery of Black people in the United States, Roots).
Still others may have encountered Malcolm first through Spike Lee's heartfelt 1991 film X, in which Malcolm is portrayed by Denzel Washington and his wife, Betty Shabazz, by Angela Bassett. (CW on the clip: shooting, extreme violence).
Malcolm X was one of the Nation of Islam's favorite sons until he saw that he was essentially in a cult, and broke with Elijah Muhammad and the Nation in the early 1960s.
Shortly after that, perhaps sensing that he did not have much time left in his earthly life, he made his pilgrimage to Mecca (Hajj) after whichhe renounced racial invective entirely in favor of worldwide Muslim brotherhood and pan-Africanism.
According to a new book by Imam Heshaam Jabber, Malcolm's spiritual advisor and the brother who led Malcolm's funeral service, Malcolm spent his last days in New York City dressed in his best clothes, hugging his wife and kids, and practicing the Islam he truly came to know only in the last year of his life.
Many people come to know of Malcolm X via his indelible Autobiography, on which he collaborated with writer Alex Haley (who went on to worldwide fame for his groundbreaking book about the African diaspora and slavery of Black people in the United States, Roots).
Still others may have encountered Malcolm first through Spike Lee's heartfelt 1991 film X, in which Malcolm is portrayed by Denzel Washington and his wife, Betty Shabazz, by Angela Bassett. (CW on the clip: shooting, extreme violence).
Malcolm X was one of the Nation of Islam's favorite sons until he saw that he was essentially in a cult, and broke with Elijah Muhammad and the Nation in the early 1960s.
Shortly after that, perhaps sensing that he did not have much time left in his earthly life, he made his pilgrimage to Mecca (Hajj) after which
According to a new book by Imam Heshaam Jabber, Malcolm's spiritual advisor and the brother who led Malcolm's funeral service, Malcolm spent his last days in New York City dressed in his best clothes, hugging his wife and kids, and practicing the Islam he truly came to know only in the last year of his life.
A true leader, and by all accounts a good man as well as a great one, which seems an extremely rare combination.
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posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 4:33 AM on February 21 [4 favorites]
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posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 4:33 AM on February 21 [4 favorites]
Read Malcolm speak.(Ibram X. Kendi intro to Malcolm X. Speaks)
posted by kozad at 5:27 AM on February 21 [2 favorites]
posted by kozad at 5:27 AM on February 21 [2 favorites]
Seems like something went wrong w kozad link above:
Ibram X. Kendi intro Malcolm X Speaks
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:28 AM on February 21 [2 favorites]
Ibram X. Kendi intro Malcolm X Speaks
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:28 AM on February 21 [2 favorites]
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posted by limeonaire at 7:00 AM on February 21
posted by limeonaire at 7:00 AM on February 21
His autobiography is fascinating and worth a read. Still striking so many decades later.
posted by Toddles at 7:17 AM on February 21
posted by Toddles at 7:17 AM on February 21
Zionist Logic By Malcolm X (The Egyptian Gazette, Sept. 17, 1964)
If the "religious" claim of the Zionists is true that they were to be led to the promised land by their messiah, and Israel's present occupation of Arab Palestine is the fulfillment of that prophesy: where is their messiah whom their prophets said would get the credit for leading them there? It was [United Nations mediator] Ralph Bunche who "negotiated" the Zionists into possession of Occupied Palestine! Is Ralph Bunche the messiah of Zionism? If Ralph Bunche is not their messiah, and their messiah has not yet come, then what are they doing in Palestine ahead of their messiah?posted by kmt at 9:15 AM on February 21 [13 favorites]
Did the Zionists have the legal or moral right to invade Arab Palestine, uproot its Arab citizens from their homes and seize all Arab property for themselves just based on the "religious" claim that their forefathers lived there thousands of years ago? Only a thousand years ago the Moors lived in Spain. Would this give the Moors of today the legal and moral right to invade the Iberian Peninsula, drive out its Spanish citizens, and then set up a new Moroccan nation...where Spain used to be, as the European Zionists have done to our Arab brothers and sisters in Palestine?
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Growing up I remember him being condemned, smeared, and slandered. I'm sure nothing has changed with our current Nazi leaders. The formation of the Black Panthers after his death was the uprising that terrified the country. White power condemned Panther violence, but didn't mind dishing it out. Malcom X spoke for racial pride and self-defense, and the Panthers ten-point program followed. A great man, we need more like him now.
posted by BlueHorse at 10:19 AM on February 21 [12 favorites]
Growing up I remember him being condemned, smeared, and slandered. I'm sure nothing has changed with our current Nazi leaders. The formation of the Black Panthers after his death was the uprising that terrified the country. White power condemned Panther violence, but didn't mind dishing it out. Malcom X spoke for racial pride and self-defense, and the Panthers ten-point program followed. A great man, we need more like him now.
posted by BlueHorse at 10:19 AM on February 21 [12 favorites]
Just before his assassination he visited Smethwick:
In Smethwick, a “colour bar” operated in housing, workplaces, shops and in pubs, denying minority ethnic workers equal pay and access to amenities. Malcolm X experienced it for himself at the Blue Gates pub, which segregated customers at the time, and, on seeing posters outside properties saying “coloured people need not apply”, said: “This is worse than in America.”
posted by Wordshore at 10:45 AM on February 21 [4 favorites]
In Smethwick, a “colour bar” operated in housing, workplaces, shops and in pubs, denying minority ethnic workers equal pay and access to amenities. Malcolm X experienced it for himself at the Blue Gates pub, which segregated customers at the time, and, on seeing posters outside properties saying “coloured people need not apply”, said: “This is worse than in America.”
posted by Wordshore at 10:45 AM on February 21 [4 favorites]
"If you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, there's no progress. If you pull it all the way out that's not progress. Progress is healing the wound that the blow made."
"They won't even admit the knife is there."
posted by AlSweigart at 11:05 AM on February 21 [21 favorites]
"They won't even admit the knife is there."
posted by AlSweigart at 11:05 AM on February 21 [21 favorites]
As someone who falls into the category of knowing him mostly through the Spike Lee film, is the film considered a fair portrait of the man by those who have studied his life?
posted by blendor at 11:29 AM on February 21
posted by blendor at 11:29 AM on February 21
"His autobiography is fascinating and worth a read. Still striking so many decades later."
As part of Michigan history in seventh grade, we read the book in class, culminating with the whole school walking down to the local theater to watch the Spike Lee movie. I can't imagine schools doing that today, and it's kind of a shame.
It is always kind of sad to me that so many people don't reckon with the last year of his life and how that complicated his legacy. Kinda like how people don't really reckon with the last years of MLK jr.'s life.
posted by klangklangston at 11:55 AM on February 21 [8 favorites]
As part of Michigan history in seventh grade, we read the book in class, culminating with the whole school walking down to the local theater to watch the Spike Lee movie. I can't imagine schools doing that today, and it's kind of a shame.
It is always kind of sad to me that so many people don't reckon with the last year of his life and how that complicated his legacy. Kinda like how people don't really reckon with the last years of MLK jr.'s life.
posted by klangklangston at 11:55 AM on February 21 [8 favorites]
See and hear Malcolm speak, about halfway into Peter Jennings' special on 1965.
posted by Rash at 1:51 PM on February 21 [1 favorite]
posted by Rash at 1:51 PM on February 21 [1 favorite]
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posted by honey badger at 9:43 PM on February 21
posted by honey badger at 9:43 PM on February 21
The Ballot or the Bullet (April 12, 1964, King Solomon Baptist Church, Detroit) [starts at 10:52; transcript, yt (with more of an intro on religion and the economics of black nationalism)]
cat brooks talking with david walker about fred hampton [@42m]: "I've always thought that Chairman Fred might well have been that black messiah that Hoover was so afraid of." (Judas and The Black Messiah)
posted by kliuless at 5:32 AM on February 22 [1 favorite]
Just as it took nationalism to remove colonialism from Asia and Africa, it'll take black nationalism today to remove colonialism from the backs and the minds of twenty-two million Afro-Americans here in this country. And 1964 looks like it might be the year of the ballot or the bullet. [applause]> The formation of the Black Panthers after his death was the uprising that terrified the country. White power condemned Panther violence, but didn't mind dishing it out.
Why does it look like it might be the year of the ballot or the bullet? Because Negroes have listened to the trickery and the lies and the false promises of the white man now for too long, and they're fed up. They've become disenchanted. They've become disillusioned. They've become dissatisfied. And all of this has built up frustrations in the black community that makes the black community throughout America today more explosive than all of the atomic bombs the Russians can ever invent. Whenever you got a racial powder keg sitting in your lap, you're in more trouble than if you had an atomic powder keg sitting in your lap. When a racial powder keg goes off, it doesn't care who it knocks out the way. Understand this, it's dangerous.
And in 1964, this seems to be the year. Because what can the white man use, now, to fool us? After he put down that March on Washington – and you see all through that now, he tricked you, had you marching down to Washington. Had you marching back and forth between the feet of a dead man named Lincoln and another dead man named George Washington, singing, "We Shall Overcome." [applause]
He made a chump out of you. He made a fool out of you. He made you think you were going somewhere and you end up going nowhere but between Lincoln and Washington. [laughter]
So today our people are disillusioned. They've become disenchanted. They've become dissatisfied. And in their frustrations they want action. And in 1964 you'll see this young black man, this new generation, asking for the ballot or the bullet. That old Uncle Tom action is outdated. The young generation don't want to hear anything about "the odds are against us." What do we care about odds? [applause]
When this country here was first being founded, there were thirteen colonies. The whites were colonized. They were fed up with this taxation without representation. So some of them stood up and said, "Liberty or death!" I went to a white school over here in Mason, Michigan. The white man made the mistake of letting me read his history books. [laughter] He made the mistake of teaching me that Patrick Henry was a patriot, and George Washington – wasn't nothing non-violent about ol' Pat, or George Washington. "Liberty or death" is was what brought about the freedom of whites in this country from the English. [applause]
They didn't care about the odds. Why, they faced the wrath of the entire British Empire. And in those days, they used to say that the British Empire was so vast and so powerful that the sun would never set on it. This is how big it was, yet these thirteen little scrawny states, tired of taxation without representation, tired of being exploited and oppressed and degraded, told that big British Empire, "Liberty or death." And here you have 22 million Afro-Americans, black people today, catching more hell than Patrick Henry ever saw. [applause]
And I'm here to tell you in case you don't know it – that you got a new, you got a new generation of black people in this country who don't care anything whatsoever about odds. They don't want to hear you ol' Uncle Tom, handkerchief-heads talking about the odds. No! [laughter, applause] This is a new generation. If they're going to draft these young black men, and send them over to Korea or to South Vietnam to face 800 million Chinese… [laughter, applause] If you're not afraid of those odds, you shouldn't be afraid of these odds. [applause]
Why is America – why does this loom to be such an explosive political year? Because this is the year of politics.
cat brooks talking with david walker about fred hampton [@42m]: "I've always thought that Chairman Fred might well have been that black messiah that Hoover was so afraid of." (Judas and The Black Messiah)
posted by kliuless at 5:32 AM on February 22 [1 favorite]
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posted by wicked_sassy at 4:29 AM on February 21