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MALCOLM X'S MESSAGE TO YOUTH

This is from a Young Socialist Alliance PDF transcript of Malcolm X in 1964 and

1965, plus written commentary by Jack Barnes and Congressman John Lewis.

We picked Malcolm's speech at the Hotel Theresa, since 37 attendees there

were in the youth-led Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

They were a courageous civil rights collective who Ella Baker mentored after

SCLC, the youngest and most willing to resist.


"One of the first things I think young people, especially nowadays,

should learn is how to see for yourself and listen for yourself.

Then you can come to an intelligent decision for yourself.

You’ll find that these guerrillas are young people.

Some of them are just children and some haven’t yet reached their teens. Most are teenagers.

It is the teenagers abroad, all over the world, who are actually involving

themselves in the struggle to eliminate oppression and exploitation.

In the Congo, the refugees point out that many of the Congolese revolutionaries are children.

 Because the revolutionaries are children, young people.


Isha Tobis Clarke, 16-year-old Youth vs. Apocalypse leader

In these countries, the young people are the ones who most quickly identify with the struggle and the necessity to eliminate the evil conditions that exist.

And here in this country, it has been my own observation that when you get into

a conversation on racism and discrimination and segregation.

You will find young people are more incensed over it, they feel more filled with an urge to eliminate it.

We’ve already issued a call for the students in the colleges and universities across the country

to launch their own independent studies of the race problem in the country.

And then bring their analyses and their suggestions for a new approach back to us

so that we can devise an action program geared to their thinking.

The accent is on youth because the youth have less at stake in this corrupt system

and therefore can look at it more objectively.


Protests in Egypt, since democracy has been uncertain

Whereas the adults usually have a stake in this corrupt system and they lose

their ability to look at it objectively because of their stake in it. (Monthly Review)

It's impossible for capitalism to survive, primarily because

the system of capitalism needs some blood to suck.

Capitalism used to be like an eagle, but now it’s more like a vulture.

It used to be strong enough to go and suck anybody’s blood whether they were strong or not.

But now it has become more cowardly, like the vulture,

and it can only suck the blood of the helpless.

As the nations of the world free themselves, then capitalism has less victims, less to suck,

and it becomes weaker and weaker.

It’s only a matter of time in my opinion before it will collapse completely."


Malcolm X

Malcolm X Talks to Young People

Generation Activism