The Autobiography of Malcolm X Language and Communication Quotes

Every phrase was edited to increase the shock mood. As the producers intended, I think people sat just about limp when the program went off. (14.139)

White reporters, anger in their voices, would call us "demagogues," and I would try to be ready after I had been asked the same question two or three times. “Well, let's go back to the Greek, and maybe you will learn the first thing you need to know about the word 'demagogue.' 'Demagogue' means, actually, 'teacher of the people.' And let's examine some demagogues. The greatest of all Greeks, Socrates, was killed as a 'demagogue.' Jesus Christ died on the cross because the Pharisees of His day were upholding their law, not the spirit. (14.38)

The program hosts would start with some kind of dice-loading, non-religious introduction for me. It would be something like—and we have with us today the fiery, angry chief Malcolm X of the New York Muslims…" I made up my own introduction. At home, or driving my car, I practiced until I could interrupt a radio or television host and introduce myself. "I represent Mr. Elijah Muhammad, the spiritual head of the fastest-growing group of Muslims in the Western Hemisphere. We who follow him know that he has been divinely taught and sent to us by God Himself. We believe that the miserable plight of America's twenty million black people is the fulfillment of divine prophecy. We also believe the presence today in America of The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, his teachings among the so-called Negroes, and his naked warning to America concerning her treatment of these so-called Negroes, is all the fulfillment of divine prophecy. I am privileged to be the minister of our Temple Number Seven here in New York City which is a part of the Nation of Islam, under the divine leadership of The Honorable Elijah Muhammad—" I would look around at those devils and their trained black parrots staring at me, while I was catching my breath—and I had set my tone. (14.54)