Malcolm X Essay

Malcolm X resists the reader to speak up against racial discrimination. In his text, "I read descriptions of atrocities, saw those illustrations of black slave women tied up and flogged with whips; of black mothers watching their babies being dragged off, never to be seen by their mothers again;of dog after slaves, and of the fugitive slave catchers, evil white men with whips and clubs and chains and guns"(Malcolm X 91). Malcolm X viewed the white men as a criminal, not guided by principles. They acted for present gain and attempted to manipulate a situation for an evil purpose. He was deeply affected by the crime and cruel act performed by white men on black people. The connection on racial discrimination is also found in Rankine's poem. In one of her poem, “You clumsily tell your friend that the next time he wants to talk on the phone he should just go in the backyard. He looks at you a long minute before saying he can speak on the phone wherever he wants.” (Rankine 15).

Here the narrator asked her friend to make phone calls in the backyard next time. He said that he would call anywhere and anytime he liked. The narrator tried to protect him from the neighbor’s racial tendencies, but his very own act made a racist out of him. Malcolm X grew up with racial discrimination that Rankine talks about in her poems. They urge the reader to fight for social equality and injustice as a right of every human being.

Another social issue that both writers bring up is a stereotyping or preconceived notion that white men have towards black people. In Malcolm X text, "The teacher had gotten a big laugh with his joke, "Negroes' feet are so big that when they walk, they leave a hole in the ground" (Malcolm X 90). The teacher had a fixed mindset about the Negroes and she generalizes towards the large population of black people. This language hurt Malcolm X feelings and he had never forgotten that. This connects to the Rankine's