Not that I regret saying what I believed to be the truth but I regret anything that I might have written or spoken that could have been used in a way to help to foster that atmosphere out of which came the loss of life of Brother Malcolm.
Not everyone likes sports. Gandhi and Malcolm X come to mind.
Malcolm X made me very strong at a time I needed to understand what I was angry about. He had peace in his heart. He exerted a big influence on me.
If we became students of Malcolm X we would not have young black men out there killing each other like they're killing each other now. Young black men would not be impregnating young black women at the rate going on now. We'd not have the drugs we have now or the alcoholism.
Because wherever I am today I still owe it to God and I owe it to two men - the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X and of course two very special women my mother and my wife.
When I was teaching in the 1960s in Boston there was a great deal of hope in the air. Martin Luther King Jr. was alive Malcolm X was alive great great leaders were emerging from the southern freedom movement.
The die is set and Malcolm will not escape for the foolish talk he spoke against his benefactor such a man is worthy of death and it would have been so were it not for Muhammad's confidence that God would give him the victory over the enemies.
If a man like Malcolm X could change and repudiate racism if I myself and other former Muslims can change if young whites can change then there is hope for America.
With guys I revere like Marcus Garvey or Malcolm X their look is less about style than purpose and the expression of beauty. It wasn't just about being noticed you know?
There was a study done in the early 20th century of all the entrepreneurs who entered the automobile industry around the same time as Henry Ford there were something like 500 automotive companies that got funded had the internal combustion engine had the technology and had the vision. Sixty percent of them folded within a couple of years.