The Ballot Or The Bullet

Malcolm X: His very name is a stab to the beliefs of the white supremacists of his time--"X" symbolizing "the rejection of 'slave-names' and the absence of an inherited African name to take its place." Similarly, in his speech "The Ballot or the Bullet", Malcolm X denounces the actions of the white population, without any attempts to appeal to them; his approach to the civil rights issue is in complete opposition to the tactics of other civil rights leaders of his time, such as Martin Luther King, Jr. Rather than trying to integrate the black community into the white, he focuses on the complete separation of them: he doesn't want the blacks to integrate into the white hotels, he wants blacks to own the hotels. He believed that the black population had to break the psychological, cultural, economic, and political dependency on their oppressors. By using tactical phrasing of his sentences that connects to his audience emotionally, Malcolm X attacks the tendency of African-Americans to identify with White America, and insists they identify instead with Africans, their ancestors; thus, he promotes his purpose: to instill a feeling of self-respect and self-help in his fellow African-Americans, which in turn is the stepping stone to the liberation of the Black people.

Malcolm X begins breaking down the bridge between Black and White America at the beginning of the speech, phrasing his sentences in such a way as to convince his audience of the fact that your place of residence does not determine who you are, and therefore blacks shouldn't identify with White America. Though blacks are considered "citizens" of the United States, Malcolm X asserts "Everything that came out of Europe, every blue-eyed thing, is already an American. As long as you and I have been over here, we aren't Americans yet." Malcolm X continuously refers back to the concept for the rest of his speech, stating that blacks are not Americans; rather, they are "just" Africans. He begins the sentence with "Everything that came out of Europe," creating the impression that absolutely everybody from Europe was accepted into American society, including low class criminals and other people of such low moral character, while all blacks, even highly educated individuals such as MLK, Jr. are still looked down upon in society--this statement fuels the already passionate and strong hatred of his black audience. Instead of referring to the white population as "white", he uses the phrase "blue-eyed thing." In doing so, he reinforces that fact that the United States has built its entire country on something as trivial as eye and skin color, which instills a feeling of pride his audience, because they, have the moral fiber to look past such irrelevancies; this statement begins to create a feeling of separation from the white population which the blacks had previously been trying to integrate into. Put together, the phrase paints a vivid image: his audience can just imagine masses of people with blond hair and blue eyes arriving in ships, flooding the streets that had been previously occupied by blacks.

He continues on to make his point stronger, to appeal to his audience's emotions in a more direct manner. Malcolm goes on to say, "Sitting at the table doesn't make you a diner, unless you eat some of what's on that plate. Being here in America doesn't make you an American...No, I'm not an American. I'm one of the 22 million black people who are victims of Americanism." This statement reinforces his previous assertion, and directly states that blacks are not Americans--it drills this fact into his audience's brains early on in the speech, so that it will ring in their ears later on, as he presents more evidence for his beliefs. By referring to the racial equality issue as "Americanism," and himself as a "victim," Malcolm creates this picture that the white population is this deadly, widespread disease, unable to control it's