Make it Plain: Malcolm X Speaks ~ Emerald Quill

May 27, 2014

Make it Plain: Malcolm X Speaks

5/27/2014 Celestine Green No comments

El Hajj Malik El-Shabazz

Malcolm X ( El Hajj Malik El-Shabazz) leaves a legacy dedicated to equality and freedom for all people. His words are as meaningful today as they were during his lifetime. Listen to him:

"The media's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses."

" If you are not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing."

"There is no better than adversity. Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss, contains its own seed, its own lesson on how to improve your performance the next time."

"Stumbling is not falling."

“Hence I have no mercy or compassion in me for a society that will crush people, and then penalize them for not being able to stand up under the weight.”

"For the freedom of my 22 million black brothers and sisters here in America, I do believe that I have fought the best that I know how, and the best that I could, with the shortcomings that I have had...I know that societies often have killed people who have helped to change those societies. And if I can die having brought any light, having exposed any meaningful truth that will help destroy the racist cancer that is malignant in the body of America then, all of the credit is due to Allah. Only the mistakes have been mine."

"We declare our right on this earth...to be a human being, to be respected as a human being, to be given the rights of a human being in this society, on this earth, in this day, which we intend to bring into existence by any means necessary."

"Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today."

"Without education, you're not going anywhere in this world."

"But it does make the black people in this country who are jobless and unemployed and standing in the welfare line very much discouraged to see a government that can't solve our problem, can't provide job opportunities for us, and at the some time not only Cubans but Hungarians and every other type of white refugee imaginable can come to this country and get everything this government has to offer."

"Truth is on the side of the oppressed."

"I am not a racist. I am against every form of racism and segregation, every form of discrimination. I believe in human beings, and that all human beings should be respected as such, regardless of their color."

"I am not a racist.... In the past I permitted myself to be used...to make sweeping indictments of all white people, the entire white race and these generalizations have caused injuries to some whites who perhaps did not deserve to be hurt. Because of the spiritual enlightenment which I was blessed to receive as a result of my recent pilgrimage to the Holy city of Mecca, I no longer subscribe to sweeping indictments of any one race. I am now striving to live the life of a true...Muslim. I must repeat that I am not a racist nor do I subscribe to the tenants of racism. I can state in all sincerity that I wish nothing but freedom, justice and equality, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all people."

"It is incorrect to classify the revolt of the Negro as simply a radical conflict of black against white or as a purely American problem. Rather, we are today seeing a global rebellion of the oppressed against the oppressor, the exploited against the exploiter."

"Usually when people are sad, they don't do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change."

"A new world order is in the making, and it is up to us to prepare ourselves that we may take our rightful place in it."

"I would like to point something out so that we'll understand each other better. I don't want you to think in the statements I made that I'm being disrespectful towards you as white people. I'm being frank. And I think that my statements will give you a better insight on the mind of a black man than most statements you get from most people who call themselves Negroes, who usually tell you what they want you to hear with the hope...that will make them draw closer to you and create a better possibility of getting from you some of the crumbs that you might let fall from your table. Well, I'm not looking for crumbs so I'm not trying to delude you."

"You're not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or who says it."

"I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it is for or against. I'm a human being, first and foremost, and as such I'm for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole."

"I believe in recognizing every human being as a human being - neither white, black, brown, or red; and when you are dealing with humanity as a family there's no question of integration or intermarriage. It's just one human being marrying another human being or one human being living around and with another human being."

"I am neither a fanatic nor a dreamer. I am a black man who loves peace, and justice, and loves his people."

"If we don't stand for something, we may fall for anything."

"I always knew it would end like this."