Quotes from Malcolm X


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We are not anti-white. But we don't have time for the white man. The white man is on top already, the white man is the boss already... he has first-class citizenship already. So you are wasting your time talking to the white man. We are working on our own people.


The white man, in his press, is going to identify me with 'hate.'


Despite my firm convictions, I have always been a man who tries to face facts, and to accept the reality of life as new experience and new knowledge unfolds. I have always kept an open mind, a flexibility that must go hand in hand with every form of the intelligent search for truth.


If you're not ready to die for it, put the word 'freedom' out of your vocabulary.


You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.


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


It's got to be the ballot or the bullet. The ballot or the bullet. If you're afraid to use an expression like that, you should get back in the cotton patch, you should get back in the alley.


America preaches integration and practices segregation.


I am for violence if non-violence means we continue postponing a solution to the American black man's problem just to avoid violence.


Power in defense of freedom is greater than power in behalf of tyranny and oppression, because power, real power, comes from our conviction which produces action, uncompromising action.


I believe in human beings, and that all human beings should be respected as such, regardless of their color.


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 it's lawful to have a rifle club to kill pheasants, it should be just as lawful to have one to kill wolves or dogs that are being sicked on little black babies. In fact, it's constitutional. Article Number Two of the constitution guarantees the right of every citizen to own a rifle or a shot gun.


If you have no critics you'll likely have no success.


A man who stands for nothing will fall for anything.


The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.


Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it.


I believe in the brotherhood of man, all men, but I don't believe in brotherhood with anybody who doesn't want brotherhood with me. I believe in treating people right, but I'm not going to waste my time trying to treat somebody right who doesn't know how to return the treatment.


Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery.


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.