I was unprepared for the emotional effect that Malcolm X, and the setting itself, would have on me... At first, he seemed like a pastor, and I expected him to speak about god. But Malcolm did not talk about god at all. What he said changed my worldview. Malcolm pointed out that many well-meaning Americans believed in integration and that many had even risked their lives for that cause. He agreed that segregation laws should be struck down. However, he challenged the idea of integration through racial mixture, which would dilute blackness until Africans no longer existed as such. Malcolm called such a process "genocide," and claimed that the American system wanted to get rid of Africans by melting them down. He said that Africans were here to stay, and to exist as a people and a nation, not as separate individuals taking their place in the American melting pot and giving themselves over to the American dream, a dream that he said was in truth a nightmare. He said that Africans in the United States would determine their own future and would do so "by any means necessary." He said that the European was a blue-eyed white devil bent on destroying the African nation and that the African people would fight to the death to defend their right to be a people and to live as a nation. He spoke for an hour with no notes and few gestures in a modulated voice that was never raised in anger. He ended his speech and immediately left the room with a bodyguard in front and behind him. The students filed out, speaking quietly among themselves. I sat on the windowsill almost in a daze. The message was different from anything I'd ever heard.

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "I was unprepared for the emotional effect that Malcolm X, and the setting itself, would have on me... At first, he seemed like a pastor, and I expected him to speak about god. But Malcolm did not talk about god at all. What he said changed my worldview. Malcolm pointed out that many well-meaning Americans believed in integration and that many had even risked their lives for that cause. He agreed that segregation laws should be struck down. However, he challenged the idea of integration through racial mixture, which would dilute blackness until Africans no longer existed as such. Malcolm called such a process "genocide," and claimed that the American system wanted to get rid of Africans by melting them down. He said that Africans were here to stay, and to exist as a people and a nation, not as separate individuals taking their place in the American melting pot and giving themselves over to the American dream, a dream that he said was in truth a nightmare. He said that Africans in the United States would determine their own future and would do so "by any means necessary." He said that the European was a blue-eyed white devil bent on destroying the African nation and that the African people would fight to the death to defend their right to be a people and to live as a nation. He spoke for an hour with no notes and few gestures in a modulated voice that was never raised in anger. He ended his speech and immediately left the room with a bodyguard in front and behind him. The students filed out, speaking quietly among themselves. I sat on the windowsill almost in a daze. The message was different from anything I'd ever heard." in the context of "Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz Outlaw Woman: A Memoir of the War Years 1960-1975 (2002)" to mean that wisdom is timeless.