Black Leaders

Fredblack · (#1 (**permalink**))

clp)Great Question. Great question for true. But a trick question as well,even though sure that was not your intention.

Well taking your question as it is posed. I would first say you have to outline the clear objectives and performance measures to evaluate each leader. But I would have no doubt, that Luther King was a 'better' leader[your term not mine] for African American people in terms of his objective and measurable performance, in delivering a lot of the basic things he sought to achieve, by no means even started, because Luther King's agenda was revolutionary in every sense of the word, and would have transformed America as we know it today.

But Malcolm X had the potential to surpass Luther King, amongst other things his superior understanding about the nature of American power, and white supremacy and the white man and his thinking and culture, and its relationship to global white supremacy and capitalism. The legacy of Malcolm will outlive and has outlived Luther King because he was right about white power,what white people are and the way for us to change that by gaining and taking realising our own collective power.

Hence Malcolm was prevented from taking Luther King's mantle because the FBI assassinated him, because they knew what we know....smoking-devil

Char-Char · (#2 (**permalink**))

@ Mr Banks-the question was about Malcom x and Martin Luther King.DUH!!!

Didn't you learn how to read fool!!!

@Fred (birdman) in his last days malcom x was all about equality for da black man just like Luther King was b4 him.

The reason he got Shot (By his own muslim brothers) was because he didnt want black to hate.So he di follow the trend of King-I would say King was better.

King was a threat to the white man because he never did anything wrong but still he gained power and respect form blacks and whites.This upset the whites in high powere because the couldn't reall charge him with ne thing thats why htey had to kill him.Duh!!!

With malcom x-he wasn't a threat-his own peeps killed him b4 he even thought of being a threat to the white man

Sista Africa · (#3 (**permalink**))

Both were assasinated at critival point X when he recognised the importance of Afican unity on a worldwide scale and the need for oppressed people worlwide to form alliances

Likewise King and particularly his stance on the US invasion of Vietnam

To understand the impact of both these leaders really have to study and understand America and the world in the 60's

There were also many other individuals (and more importantly organisations) which played a role in the sixties

Burning Spear · (#4 (**permalink**))

Great Question wrote:

Quote:

Who was a better leader for Black people; Malcolm X or Martin Luther King?

Quote:

--------------------------------------------------

Quote:

The short answer for this is easy,MLK hands down. The laws and social mores of the USA went thru dramatic change because of the actions of King and his movement.

Quote:

Malcolm did not venture south and confront the racists in their own backyard as MLK did.He mostly gave speechs in NYC and white northern colleges and universities.

Quote:

MLK changed laws and confronted americas inequality in the courts,boardrooms,and public facilities.Malcolm spent alot of time dodging Elijah Muhammed and the Nation.

res · (#5 (**permalink**))

malcolm xcompletely and utterly!!! Martin luther king with his christianity and pacifism just doesn't mean a thing to me!

Burning Spear · (#6 (**permalink**))

res wrote:

Quote:

malcolm xcompletely and utterly!!! Martin luther king with his christianity and pacifism just doesn't mean a thing to me!

Quote:

------------------------------------------------

Quote:

Please explain this? The question asked who was the best leader for Black people.Folks need to seperate the rhetoric from the accomplishments.

Quote:

I'm a malcom fan.Spoke with many folks who heard him speech at mosques in Detroit,Washington DC, and NYC.I posed this question and all answered MLK, because of the tangible results from his "pacifist" actions.

Burning Spear · (#7 (**permalink**))

N.A.T. wrote:

Quote:

Marcus Garvey was definately better and achieved way way way more than Martin or Malcolm X. Marcus Garvey organised 13million people all over the worldin 3 years and made harlem one of the richst state in the U.S.. He actions were soo great that the same Pan Africanist people who fought him back in the days are sweating today to claim him as if he was down with Pan Africanism. But they and we know he followed the strategies of anAfrican Internationalist.

-----------------------------------------

Quote:

N.A.T,

Quote:

Harlem is not a state.It was a neighborhood in NYC.The area did not proper under UNITA.

res · (#8 (**permalink**))

Pacifism is supposed to preach 'non-violent' action, when in truth it often preaches 'non-action'. In the case of activists like Martin Luther King (although their intentions were very good) I do not believe that to tell a nation of down-trodden abused people that the way to be treated better is to allow the oppressors to beat you whilst standing there and just qietly taking it because you're a 'pacifist' is not only wrong it's very very dangerous. In western civilisation we are often taught to accept our lot inlife (the concept of an after life reinforces that). What we should be being taught is that if you are being treated badly fight back! If the whites beat you down, beat them back! Don't stand there and whisper that you don't like it, fight fire with fire! Malcolm X fought back. If someone beat down your door and tried tokill your family what would you respect more: someone who asked them nicely to leave or someone who made sure they left???

Also on the issue of martin luther king being a christian I find it very hard to accept any african person claiming to be a christian, when if you look back historically christianity was forced on black slaves by the so-called white 'civilisers'! Does that answer your question?

Burning Spear · (#9 (**permalink**))

res wrote:

Quote:

Malcolm X fought back. If someone beat down your door and tried tokill your family what would you respect more: someone who asked them nicely to leave or someone who made sure they left???

Also on the issue of martin luther king being a christian I find it very hard to accept any african person claiming to be a christian, when if you look back historically christianity was forced on black slaves by the so-called white 'civilisers'! Does that answer your question?
----------------------------------------

Quote:

I'm going to interject some realism into this res.That's because you are speaking nonsense and someone needs to "pull your coat".My father and alot of his freinds were contemporaries to Malcolm Little.They saw him speak in the mosque's in Washington DC and other cities.The reality was Malcolm fought noone except other members of the Nation.I love Malocolm but if one critically looked at his most productive period say 1962-65 most of the time was fighting with Elijah M and making speeches to white colleges in the northern part of the US.King ventured south and dealt with the racistists head on.Those are facts.Malcolm went to Selma,Alabama ( a stone cold hotbed of anti-Black reactionism ) just once.Where MLK went dozens of times for action, not speechmaking.

Quote:

Also let's also kill this "Chrisitianity is not the Black man's religion and Islam is" nonsense. Arabs swept thru large swaths of Africa "converting "Africans with the tip of the sword.In other words convert or die.It was fostered of Blacks in a more brutal fashion than Christianity ever was.

res · (#10 (**permalink**))

my point about christianity was not to say islam is any better, but christianity is a religion of judaeo-christian tradition!!! And to say 'the arabs' forced islam on the africans in a harsher way than the westerners and christianity is completely ludicrous. Come on now. Both were morally worng and terrible but you compare the arab slave trade to the western slave trade and see which one outnumbers the other!!!

Burning Spear · (#11 (**permalink**))

res wrote:

Quote:

my point about christianity was not to say islam is any better, but christianity is a religion of judaeo-christian tradition!!! And to say 'the arabs' forced islam on the africans in a harsher way than the westerners and christianity is completely ludicrous. Come on now. Both were morally worng and terrible but you compare the arab slave trade to the western slave trade and see which one outnumbers the other!!!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't know the religious breakdown of Africa to make a comment on.

ThE TRAVELLAR · (#12 (**permalink**))

MALCOM X WAS MIXED RACE ACCORDING TO WHAT I HEARD, LIKE NAS SAID **** BLACK LEADERS COS WHITES DONT HAVE ONE, WHY LET SOMEONE TELL YOU WHAT U CAN DO FOR YOUR SELF.