Martin Luther King Vs. Malcolm X/Black Power Movement

Africans were brought to America by Europeans, not of their own volition, but in chains, without the knowledge that over the next several hundred years, generations and generations of our people would be brutally and unjustly treated as nothing more than property or animals. The era during which slavery flourished, Africans were bred, overworked, beaten, lynched, and stripped of any positive identity or self respect. When slavery was abolished in 1865, Africans, or former slaves, were left without a "place" in America. Where did they fit in? What was the role that they were to play as, so called, American citizens? Some, undertook the role of "leader", and preached and taught what they felt was the best process by which, blacks could achieve
Martin Luther King and Malcolm X aimed toward a similar goal for blacks. Both wanted it to be realized by blacks and whites than blacks were not inferior to whites in any way. King and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (The name Malcolm adopted after his visit to Mecca) respectively employed non-violent and aggressive (which is often times termed as violent) methods to achieve the common goal. King is associated with the Civil Rights, non-violent, passive leader in the struggle. Malcolm X is linked to the Black Power, armed, "By any means necessary" aggressive solution to the race/class problem, which gave black a sense of self worth and empowerment, which would be lost if complete integration was
He, eventually, like his mother learned to resent his fair complexion because, instead of feeling as though it was a status symbol, both realized that it was the mark of an evil "white devil" who raped Malcolm's mother's mother. Malcolm and his mother both married people whose complexion was darker than their own in an attempt to rectify the guilt that they harbored. Malcolm's father followed the teachings of Marcus Garvey, and believed "…that freedom, independence and self-respect could never be achieved by the Negro in America, and that therefore the Negro should leave America to the white man and return to his African land of origin" ( The Autobiography of Malcolm X p2). Domestic abuse was commonplace in the Little home. The Little home was burned to the ground by The Klu Klux Klan, the same hate group which was responsible for the murder of Malcolm's father. Malcolm's father was cruelly murdered (as were all of his siblings except one), and the known culprits were never held accountable. After his father's murder, Malcolm's mother was left to raise eight children on her own. Soon after his father was killed, Malcolm's mother had a mental breakdown, and the children were split up among different foster families. Theses negative course of events influenced the antipathy that Malcolm felt