Source:Smithsonian Channel– Minister Malcolm X, I believe in 1964.

“In 1962, a confrontation with the LAPD outside a mosque resulted in the death of a Nation of Islam member. It was an event seized on by an outraged Malcolm X, who would condemn it in an impassioned speech. From the Series: The Lost Tapes: Malcolm X:Smithsonian Channel. ”

From the Smithsonian Channel

I’ve always had mixed feelings about Minister Malcolm X. I like the fact that he was a champion of individual freedom and self-empowerment, and self-improvement for African-Americans in a decade, where leftists were calling for more welfare and not just the Great Society, but going even further than that and saying that African-Americans or anyone else going through poverty shouldn’t even need to work or get a good education to live well in America.

But pre-Mecca, Saudi Arabia (1964) Malcolm X was a racist. There’s no other way of factually describing how he felt about European-Americans even European-Americans who weren’t racists and at least sympathized if not publicly supported what Minister Malcolm was trying to accomplish and what his movement was about.

When it comes to Minister Malcolm’s own racism his supporters will either deny it or blame it on the fact that so many European-Americans hated African-Americans and because of that Malcolm saw all European-Americans (or what they would call white people, or use stronger language than that) as devils and evil people. But when you hate or dislike people simply because of their race regardless of what your race is and what race or races you hate, you’re a racist.

At Mecca and after Mecca Minister Malcolm could see that not all Europeans were bad people and that not even all European-Americans were bad people. When he was at Mecca he was at one of the largest melting pots in the world. Muslims from all over the world, even from Europe, from Southern Europe in the Balkans were, good, hard working, productive  people that didn’t judge people by their race or complexion.

It’s hard to be a smart person when you’re not even willing to learn and especially learn about your own mistakes and use that new information and facts to correct your own mistakes. Minster Malcolm learned that not all European-Americans were racists and devils and because of this was no longer a racist himself and became a much better leader for African-Americans, because now he was able to speak to more people, including people who didn’t look like him or agree with him on every issue.

And 55 years later Minister Malcolm X is still missed today by millions of Americans from multiple races who would’ve loved to have seen what his movement (the real Black Power movement) could have accomplished.