The Autobiography of Malcolm X

by Malcolm X

The white police and firemen came and stood around watching as the house burned down to the ground.

I would think to myself that Wilfred, for being so nice and quiet, often stayed hungry.

This is the sort of kindly condescension which I try to clarify today, to these integration-hungry Negroes, about their “liberal” white friends, these so-called “good white people”—most of them anyway. I don’t care how nice one is to you; the thing you must always remember is that almost never does he really see you as he sees himself, as he sees his own kind. He may stand with you through thin, but not thick; when the chips are down, you’ll find that as fixed in him as his bone structure is his sometimes subconscious conviction that he’s better than anybody black.

You don’t even know your true family name, you wouldn’t recognize your true language if you heard it.

This “Negro” was taught to worship an alien God having the same blond hair, pale skin, and blue eyes as the slavemaster.

“Do you know why the white man really hates you? It’s because every time he sees your face, he sees a mirror of his crime—and his guilty conscience can’t bear to face it!