The autobiography
of Malcolm X
Grave Press Inc. New York, 1966
With the assistance of Alex Haley
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If you want something, you had better make some
noise
If you see somebody winning all the time, he isn't
gambling, he's cheating
Anytime you find someone more successful than you
are - you know they're doing something that you aren't |
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The thing you must always remember is that almost
never does he /white man/ really see you as he sees himself,
as he sees his own kind... you'll find that as fixed in him as
his bone structure is his sometimes subconscious conviction that
he' s better than anybody black
The main thing you got to remember is that everything
in the world is a hustle
I had learned enough about women to know not to pressure
them when they're thinking something out; they'll tell you when
they're ready
Never ask a woman about other men. Either she'll tell
you a lie and you still won't know, or she tells you the truth
you might note have wanted to hear it in the first place.
In the ghetto, as in suburbia, its the same status
struggle to stand out in some envied way from the rest.
All you had to do was give white people a show and
they'd buy anything you offered them.
... and in that kind of community, survival is what
is respected.
More wives could keep their husbands if they realized
their greatest urge is to be men.
All woman, by the nature, are fragile and weak: they
are attracted to the male in whom they see strength.
In order to get something you had to look as though
you already had something.
Any experienced hustler will tell you that getting
greedy is the quickest way to prison.
Things never fully are right again with anyone you
have seen trying to kill you.
One could be as lazy as he wanted, if he would only
use is head.
I'll tell you that tobacco in all its forms is just
as much an addiction as any narcotic
Behind bars, a man never reforms. He will never forget.
He will never got completely over the memory of the bars.
If somebody is trying to put you onto something you
need to listen
Only guilt admitted accepts truth
Everything that happens - Islam teaches - is written
Always teach in terms that the people could understand
To tell a woman not to talk too much was like telling
Jesse James not to carry a gun, or telling a hen not to cackle.
If you are thinking about doing a thing, you ought
to make up your mind if you are going to do it, or not to do
it
History shows that an educated slave always begins
to ask, and next demand, equality with his master.
As you saw, so shall you reap.
I had enough experience to know that in order to be
a good organizer of anything which you expect to succeed - including
yourself - you must almost mathematically analyze cold facts.
No man has believed perfectly until he wishes for
his brother what he wishes to himself.
My whole life has been a chronology of - changes
No one would wish to be embarrassed trying to help
a brother who shows no evidence that he wants that help - and
who seems to refuse to cooperate in his own interest
Whenever the spiritual values have been submerged,
if not destroyed, by emphasis upon the material things, invariably,
the woman reflect it.
Truly a paradise could exist wherever material progress
and spiritual values could be properly balanced.
I realized how very dangerous is to people to hold
on any human being in such esteem, especially to consider anyone
some sort of "divinely guided" and "protected"
person.
I believe it's crime for anyone who is being brutalized
to continue to accept that brutality without doing something
to defend himself.
Mankind's history has proved from one era to another
that the true criterion of leadership is spiritual. Men are attracted
by spirit. By power, men are forced. Love is engendered by spirit.
By power, anxieties are created.
I am in agreement one hundred per cent with those
racists who say that no government laws ever can force brotherhood.
The white man is not inherently evil, but American's
racist society influences him to act evilly. The society has
produced and nourishes a psychology which brings out the lowest,
most base part of human beings.
No matter what job a man had, at least he ought to
be able to think for himself
I said I respected every man's right to believe whatever
his intelligence tells him is intellectually sound, and I expect
everyone else to respect my right to believe likewise.
Anger can blind human vision.
But it is only after the deepest darkness that the
greatest joy can come; it is only after slavery and prison that
the sweetest appreciation of freedom can come.
It's the hinge the squeaks that gets the grease.
A prisoner has time that he can put to good use. I'd
put prison second to college as the best place for a man to go
he needs to do some thinking. If he's motivated, in prison he
an change his life.
Learn wisdom from the pupil of the eye that looks
upon all things and yet to self is blind. (Persian poet)
People don't realize how a mans whole life can be
changed by one book.
I think that anybody who is in a position to discipline
others should first learn to accept discipline himself.
There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in
action. (Goethe)
Children have a lesson adults should learn, to not
to be ashamed of failing, but to get up and try again. Most of
us adults are so afraid, so cautious, so 'safe', and therefore
so shrinking and rigid and afraid that it is why so may humans
fail. Most middle-aged adults have resigned themselves to failure.
In life, nothing is permanent; not even life itself.
Only the unasked question is stupid.
Whether you use bullets or ballots, you've got to
aim well; don't strike at the puppet, strike the puppeteer.
A silent tongue does not betray its owner
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