Malcolm X Study Questions for Chapters 10-12
One. What defines the hell of Malcolm’s stay in prison?
The bars leave an indelible print, the “toilet buckets” are odious and can weaken any man (245). Beyond the physical imprisonment, is the demoralization of the spirit and the collapse into a provisionary existence (no meaning, just day-to-day survival) in which one becomes an animal, a creature without meaning and this nihilism infects the prisoner for a lifetime.
Getting high on drugs becomes the only way to bear the crushing torture of prison life.
He appears to be following Jeff Henderson's motif in which falling is rising. To suffer is to die to the old, diseased self, a necessary step toward transformation.
His main demon: self-hatred, which was taught by white culture: "You're black; therefore your existence is a curse."
Two. Why is Malcolm called “Satan” and what are the roots of his religious hatred?
White supremacy was tied up with Christianity and Malcolm saw this religious hybrid as the vehicle for slavery, Jim Crow, and general racism against black people. The sheer hypocrisy of “religion” brought out the madman and the demon.
In other words, Malcolm spent his life watching white people interpret the Bible in such a way that their God blessed white people for enslaving black people. This white supremacist narrative that dehumanized black people naturally infuriated Malcolm and made him “Satan” toward the white man’s religion.
He had been infected with the disease of self-hating racism, an invention of White Supremacy.
A lot of Malcolm's hate was a natural reaction to throwing out the poison anti-bodies from absorbing self-hating racism all his life.
Three. What important influence does Bimbi have on Malcolm’s life?
On page 246, we read that Bimbi is an intellectual with a command of the language and he commands respect from all people, guards and other prisoners alike.
A person in command of language can fight false narratives and replace them with truth. Therefore, Bimbi is someone of high appeal.
He has a power that is beyond Malcolm’s hustle and nihilism and Malcolm is intrigued by this power that he has never entertained until then.
We all need mentors and role models. It’s a natural hunger.
I think of my college years I was influenced by four people, Franz Kafka, a novelists and short story writer who taught me how to get in touch with my demons; Vladimir Nabokov, a novelist, who taught me how to be confident and authoritative with one’s writing and to have no patience for pretentiousness; Malcolm X, who taught me that anger could be channeled into intellectual self-improvement; and David Letterman, the comedian, who taught me deadpan irony (making jokes and sarcastic remarks with no smile, a “straight face”).
These four figures have left an imprint on me that remain to this day.
Malcolm's tragedy is that his mentor back-stabbed him.
Four. What does Malcolm learn about self-improvement with his new Muslim faith?
That God helps those who help themselves. As we read on page 250, “If you will take one step toward Allah—Allah will take two steps toward you.”
In other words, don’t sit around and wait for people to love you and help you; otherwise, you will die alone. He develops self-reliance.
Religious or not, when we help ourselves, we find that we create momentum so that it feels like we're getting outside help. We have to begin by breaking free from intertia or stagnation.
Shortly after, Malcolm, with the help of his family, moves to a more humane prison, Norfolk Prison Colony (251).
Five. Malcolm’s brother says “The white man is the devil.” Why would this be easy for Malcolm to believe?
He saw his whole race subjugated to the evil of white supremacy so that even decent white people were unwittingly racist and condescending to him and they were the exception. The rule was white people who behaved belligerently toward him and his people and white people wanted Malcolm to be apologetic about his existence and “know his place.” See page 253.
The worst thing the white devil did to Malcolm was deny him the knowledge of who he was, where he came from, what language he spoke, and what intellectual and cultural legacy he came from (255). In fact, Africa was the cradle of civilization, where blacks were the descendents of kings and princes (256).
White supremacy, the evil religion, taught black people that they were “savages” and “heathens” who needed to be enslaved by white people in order to be “tamed” (256).
White supremacy, the devil religion, taught black people to hate everything black, including themselves, and to love everything white, to aspire to the whiteness that would forever elude them (257).
There’s two kinds of white supremacy: White Supremacy Bold: In your face racist belligerence.
And White Supremacy “Lite”: no racist language is used, no brazen racism is unleashed, just an insidious and often unconscious racism that condescends to and belittles black people with the racism of diminished expectations.
Either way, Bold or Lite, white supremacy teaches blacks to hate themselves.
Seeing these truths in such a powerful manner for the first time, Malcolm says he “was in a daze” like St. Paul who converted in Damascus and was blown away by a blinding light (257).
Six. On page 262 what evidences that Malcolm didn’t believe everything taught by the Nation of Islam such as the story of Mr. Yacub?
Malcolm blames Muslims in the Eastern World that Western Muslims created these crazy stories because they were abandoned by the rest of the world.
Seven. What’s the first impulse that overcomes Malcolm as he achieves literacy?
He must write letters to his old friends and share his voice, his message, and a sense of urgency about the human condition, the American black person’s condition, to everyone in the world.
He begins by changing himself and then he wants to change America and the world. As a result, he becomes one of the most powerful voices against white supremacy in American history and remains a controversial icon today. See page 264.
Eight. How does McMahon defend, if at all, Malcolm’s charge that “the white man is the devil”?
It’s McMahon’s belief that Malcolm had so internalized the self-hatred of the sick white supremacy religion that he needed a strong antidote to cleanse his soul of this self-loathing and that the “white man is devil” doctrine was the medicine he craved and it worked to channel Malcolm’s anger outward, no longer inward and destroying himself.
In other words, he had to transfer the hatred, once directed toward himself, to another agent.
If we stand in Malcolm’s shoes, here’s his history with white people:
He’s the descendent of slavery.
KKK now terrorizes him in his own home.
The police ramshackle his own home as if it were theirs.
A KKK splinter group murders his father in a brutal fashion and there are no arrests and no police investigation.
The Welfare State breaks up his family and drives his mother into a state of madness.
His white teacher tells him to “know his place” and give up professional aspirations, instead vying for lowly servant work.
He’s denigrated by the N word everywhere he goes. White people spit the word with hostility or use it with complacent, languid contempt.
The white people steal his history, giving him “white” history and in essence steal his identity.
The white people are quick to steal black people’s music and culture and call it their own and then have the hubris to dismiss and deny all black achievement.
Therefore, the message that the white man is the devil isn’t that farfetched. If I were in his shoes, I’d come to similar conclusions. Who wouldn’t?
To Malcolm’s credit, as he evolved and developed his ideas, his views on skin color changed so that ascribing the qualities of a devil were not based on skin color but on false and racist ideology. Sadly, this evolution contributed to his assassination.
Nine. What does Malcolm say learning books did to change his life on page 274?
They made his “mind come alive” and “attacked his ignorance” and awakened a sleeping giant inside of him, helping articulate his rage and discontent with the world. They gave him a voice so he could articulate his passion in written and spoken form.
Without exaggeration, learning to read raised him from the dead and resurrected his life.
Ten. At the end of Chapter 12, Malcolm says he would someday face a “psychological and spiritual crisis” in regards to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. Can you anticipate this crisis?
Any man who makes himself into a controlling god-like figure is inevitably going to be revealed as corrupt. Yes?
Research Paper Assignment
McMahon said in class that “Malcolm X was an autodidactic genius who showed us that literacy could be used as a vital tool for two essential undertakings: The first was to strip away the façade of a false America, replace the mythic America with a sobering reality, that of a country that relied on white supremacy as the foundation of its economy and identity and that this false religion, white supremacy, continues to metastasize across the country, in different forms, today; the second was to use literacy to reinvent the self, a self mired in ignorance, degradation, learned helplessness, victimization, and moral dissolution, into a person of knowledge, dignity, critical thinking, purpose, and effective action.”
But some people disagree with McMahon’s "exalted view" of Malcolm X and argue that Malcolm X was a hustler and a demagogue who reinvented himself through fabrication, contrivance, exaggeration of racism, and myth-making to reinvent his view of America, and himself, and that this view of America is unjustly skewed, pessimistic, and hellish in its rendering.
Which camp do you belong to, McMahon’s or McMahon’s critics? Defend your position in a thesis that generates a six-page research paper of about 1,500 words. Remember you don’t have to agree with McMahon to write a successful paper. However, you do need to devote a section of your essay to refuting your opponents if your essay is to be A-grade.
Your guidelines are as follows:
This research paper should present a thesis that is specific, manageable, provable, and contestable—in other words, the thesis should offer a clear position, stand, or opinion that will be proven with research.
You should analyze and prove your thesis using examples and quotes from a variety of sources.
You need to research and cite from at least five sources. You must use at least 3 different types of sources.
At least one source must be from an ECC library database.
At least one source must be a book, anthology or textbook.
At least one source must be from a credible website, appropriate for academic use.
The paper should not over-rely on one main source for most of the information. Rather, it should use multiple sources and synthesize the information found in them.
This paper will be approximately 5-7 pages in length, not including the Works Cited page, which is also required. This means at least 5 full pages of text. The Works Cited page does NOT count towards length requirement.
You must use MLA format for the document, in-text citations, and Works Cited page.
You must integrate quotations and paraphrases using signal phrases and analysis or commentary.
You must sustain your argument, use transitions effectively, and use correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
Your paper must be logically organized and focused.
Brainstorming for Your Essay
Malcolm X was self-taught in prison.
He had to unlearn self-hating, internalized racism that was stuffed down his throat all his life.
He had to unlearn a fake US history that painted white people as innocent, God-loving, good people and blacks as subhumans who didn't deserve to be afforded dignity or their basic humanity.
He had to unlearn a false America described above.
He developed a love for his people, a disgraced people whose dignity needed to be restored.
He was committed to helping black Americans unlearn the lies white America told them and learn a new narrative.
Malcolm's new narrative from Elijah Muhammad was extreme but it purged Malcolm's self-hatred.
So in love with gratitude for Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm was deceived by a corrupt leader and again Malcolm had to unlearn a false doctrine. Malcolm went to Mecca and became a universal Muslim who saw evil, not as a skin color issue, but as a spiritual issue.
During this second evolution, Malcolm was a target from Elijah Muhammad and his people for at least two reasons: One, Malcolm knew about Elijah's affairs with his secretaries and this was a huge scandal from a man who said to follow him one must be pure.
Secondly, there was jealousy as Malcolm was becoming the world's greatest champion of black rights.
Malcolm X critics say his book has exaggerations that make Malcolm into a myth. Perhaps that is partly true.
Malcolm X critics say Malcolm was a hate-monger who didn't use peace the way Martin Luther King did. Others say, Malcolm's rage was justified. We see this controversy here.
Thesis That Defends Malcolm X with a Concession Clause
While Malcolm X was far from a perfect man, prone to hate-mongering demons, venomous demagoguery, and less than accurate details in his Autobiography, his overall force as a champion for human rights is undeniable when we consider ___________, ________________, _______________, __________________, and _________________.
Another Thesis That Defends Malcolm X with a Concession Clause
Even though we can ascribe major faults in Malcolm X’s character, including exaggerations in his Autobiography, an unsavory, blind commitment to the corrupt Elijah Muhammad, and an irrational castigation of the entire white race, his evolution, integrity, and power as a champion for restoring dignity to an oppressed people is evidenced by __________________, ___________________, ___________________, and _____________________.
Thesis That Refutes Malcolm X with a Concession Clause
While Malcolm X played an important role in America’s dialogue about racism and the country’s false history of freedom and innocence, Malcolm X cannot qualify as a great human rights leader, along the likes of Martin Luther King, because ___________________, _________________, ________________, and _____________________.
Although Malcolm X spoke an urgent truth to the condition of racism afflicting black people in America, his overall message collapses when we consider ___________________, ______________________, __________________, and _______________________.
In-class Exercise:
Work on a thesis with a concession clause. I recommend that you transition this thesis from your introduction.
Was Malcolm's "reinvention" the mark of a fraud or the mark of a man with integrity and greatness?
Here's a source you can use for your essay:
Explain.
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